


At the Edge of Centuries

by the_rck



Series: House of Sulfur and Mercury [8]
Category: Chronicles of Amber - Roger Zelazny
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Dark, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Artificial Intelligence, Dark Merlin, Intrigue, M/M, Slavery, Stockholm Syndrome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-07
Updated: 2017-10-04
Packaged: 2018-11-10 12:24:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 8
Words: 23,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11126946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_rck/pseuds/the_rck
Summary: Merlin finds a relative in an unexpected place. The news she brings makes him fear that things are about to get Patternfall levels of bad again. He knows where he stands, but he's not so sure about everybody else.





	1. Finding an Unexpected Relative

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Julia Otxoa's poem, “Children of the Century.”
> 
> This is part of a branching series of AUs, all of which start from something different happening after Luke left Merlin imprisoned at the end of Trumps of Doom. The list of stories and details of when/how they diverge from each other is [here](http://somethingdarker.dreamwidth.org/36076.html) on DreamWidth. This story branches off somewhere in the middle of We Are Where We Began when Ghostwheel tells Luke and Merlin that he's not okay with Merlin having more biological children.
> 
> This includes some OCs in the form of Merlin's AI children. Some of them will be important here or in the sequel stories. 
> 
> When I started this, I intended to focus on the universe altering plot and see where it took me, but that's not where the story went, so there will be sequels dealing with that.

Merlin having me on a leash probably should have bothered me more than it did. I’m not sure if he even thought about whether or not I’d mind. At any rate, he hadn’t done it as if it were something that he expected to be humiliating, no amusement at the prospect and no apology either. Both of us knew that Ghostwheel and his other children were the real leash. There wasn’t anywhere I could go where they couldn’t find me.  
   
At least he was letting me walk upright and wear clothing.  
   
He hadn't bothered to tell me where we were going. That, I was sure, was deliberate. There were plenty of places I knew we weren't going, mostly not anywhere we might meet relatives. Probably not Earth either. Merlin liked to hurt me but not that much, and there was the risk of running into people who we had known. Merlin didn't want that any more than I did.  
   
Just before we left, Merlin changed shape. He became taller. His skin changed color to become a harsh gray that looked armored. His arms had an extra joint. His eyes changed shape and color.  
   
I knew the form well enough to know he had viciously sharp, retractable claws and teeth made for tearing. This was Merlin of House Sawall, and I was glad he had put the leash on before changing form. Otherwise, I'd have assumed I was in for a very bad day indeed.  
   
He turned his head to look at me. “Don't speak unless I address you or give you permission. Not punishing you for it would be taken as a sign of weakness.”  
   
I nodded and looked at the floor, trying not to let my uneasiness show.  
   
He ran the back of his hand along my cheek. “I'm buying,” he told me, “and bringing you tells the intelligent ones that I probably won't kill them.”  
   
I leaned into his hand.  
   
He hesitated and cleared his throat. “I've bought there before but not from this dealer and… not for this purpose.” He touched my neck with just the barest hint of claw. “Some of the… merchandise is highly trained. Some are meant to be challenging. Some are disposable.”  
   
I did my best to hide my nausea. I'd known Merlin would want other toys, other victims, eventually, but I’d started to think I was wrong as years passed without him doing anything in that direction. Well, without him telling me he was doing anything in that direction. I closed my eyes for a moment. I’d been too much of a coward to ask.  
   
It didn't matter. It shouldn't matter. But it would change things.  
   
“If you see something that appeals to you, let me know. I will consider it.”  
   
Something. Not someone. I nodded. There wasn't anything else safe to do.  
   
Given Merlin's form, I wasn't surprised that we traveled by Logrus. We arrived in an ornate but also very open space. The walls were white and gold with occasional bits of black that I thought must be writing. The ceiling was high, arched, and either glass or crystal.  
   
Many people of many different species moved through the chamber. Most seemed to scan the walls then pick a direction. I wondered which way we'd go.  
   
The person who approached us looked human at first glance, but when they bowed, I realized not. No human could bend quite that way, and their hair was actually moving tendrils of some sort.  
   
The person addressed Merlin in a language I didn't know and in a tone that I did. Fawning deference came through clearly. They gestured to the right and bowed again.  
   
Merlin nodded and tugged lightly on my leash.  
   
I followed. We went through several corridors and down four flights of stairs. The decor changed, becoming both more opulent and vaguely obscene. I supposed they didn't want anyone wandering in without knowing what they were getting.  
   
We ended up in a private room. Merlin sat on a chair while I knelt beside him. He looked down at me. I only recognized his expression as a smile because I'd seen it before. “You may speak now, if you wish.” He stroked my head. “Enzal is going to show us images of individuals who might interest me.”  
   
Something in Merlin’s tone told me that he wasn’t actually sure what he was looking for.  
   
“I enjoyed breaking you, so perhaps that.”  
   
I flinched, and he laughed.  
   
“Then again, something well trained and eager to please might be pleasant.” He ran a finger across my lips, and I parted them automatically so that he could push inside if he wanted. He did, and I started licking and sucking in the hope that that would please him.  
   
The images were three dimensional, moving projections. That is, the people being shown moved, and our perspective on them did, too. Merlin was obviously familiar with the mechanism because he was able to shift things around with small gestures when he wanted a close up or a view from a different angle.  
   
All of the people looked like adult humans. There were some with features that our Amber relatives would not have accepted as human, but they were all humanoid bipeds, obviously either male or female and configured so that Merlin could fuck them in his human form if he wanted to. Most of them, at least to my eye, looked very obviously drugged. The ones that weren’t were equally obviously trying to look sexually appealing.  
   
There was text of some sort with each image. Merlin read occasional snippets of it to me, translating as he went, but mostly, he didn’t bother. He asked me, three times, whether I thought a particular person might appeal to Martin. In each case, I nodded. I had no idea, really, what Martin might like, but I didn’t think saying that would be at all wise. Merlin marked all three of them and quite a few others for in person inspection.  
   
We had looked at dozens of images when one came up that caught my attention. For a moment, I wasn’t sure why. Then I was equally sure that the woman pictured was someone I knew, knew but couldn’t quite remember.  
   
She was drugged and bound which I took to mean that she was actively dangerous otherwise. I searched my mind for a name or a context and came up empty.  
   
Merlin was about to go on to the the next image when I nudged his leg and said, “Please, Merlin.”  
   
He went completely still. He looked at the image then looked down at me. “Are you sure?”  
   
I hesitated then told him the truth. “I know her. At least, I think I do. I don’t remember, but I do.” I could hear something approaching panic in my voice, so I shut my mouth and just leaned against him.  
   
“Ah.” He rubbed my back for almost a minute before he turned back to the image. He frowned at it and studied the attached text. Then he looked at Enzal and said something in that language I couldn’t understand.  
   
Enzal bowed, came over, and pressed their hand against the block of text hovering in mid-air. The letters shifted and rearranged. Suddenly, there was more text in smaller print. Enzal stepped backward until they reached the wall.  
   
Merlin studied the text. He flicked his fingers, and it started to scroll. “She’s mute,” he told me. “They don’t think she was to begin with, but they don’t know. She’s strong, and she attacks with anything that comes to hand when she feels threatened. Which is most of the time.”  
   
I raised my head and looked at him. “Because she’s here.”  
   
He shrugged, granting my point. “She might simply be a Shadow of someone you know.”  
   
That was possible, even likely. I looked at the floor.  
   
“It’s what they don’t say that’s most interesting… There’s nothing about where she came from or how they acquired her. That’s unusual and probably indicates that she’s someone’s enemy. Maybe someone other people might be searching for.” Now, he sounded intrigued. “I think she’s been here a while which probably means they’re only offering her to… certain customers.”  
   
“Please,” I said softly.  
   
“If she hurts you, I will retaliate.” There was definite warning in his voice.  
   
I didn’t move.  
   
After a moment, he sighed. “You knew I couldn’t say no.”  
   
I hadn’t. I’d hoped, but I hadn’t known.  
   
He studied the image again. “Whoever she is, she must be far off of Sawall’s radar… They know that part of my family here and not… the other.”  
   
I was startled that anyone might know one part and not the other.  
   
He frowned slightly. He marked the image as he had others. “I’ll see what I can learn later. She’ll look different when she’s actually here.”  
   
By which he meant that he and Ghostwheel could study her in ways that weren’t visual.  
   
I paid closer attention after that, but I didn’t recognize anyone else. Merlin probably would have been happy to buy me a dozen toys, but I’d have had to fuck them and to pretend I was doing it because I wanted to. I didn’t think I could do that.  
   
When Merlin had finished browsing the catalog, servants brought him food and then, when he said something sharp, brought food for me as well. Judging by the smell, what Merlin had wasn’t human edible. I was pretty sure that what they brought me was not of a quality they’d serve a guest.  
   
I didn’t complain. I didn’t feel hungry at all, so I only intended to eat enough to show Merlin that I was being obedient.  
   
Enzal left us alone to eat. I imagine they needed to make arrangements for us to see Merlin’s selections.  
   
“If I weren’t Lord Sawall’s brother and the King’s brother,” Merlin murmured, “they’d actually make us go to the pens and walk from display to display. A private showing is a serious pain in the ass for them.” He stroked my hair. “If you like, Luke, I can buy you two or three of the ones marked for death.”  
   
I knew Merlin well enough to be sure that he wasn’t offering to let me kill them. He probably wouldn’t stop me if I wanted to, but he knew me better than that. I’d kill if he wanted me to. I’d kill to protect myself. If I had his permission, at least.  
   
The odds were that he wouldn’t expect me even to speak to his ‘present’ to me. He knew I’d like to think they were alive when they’d been doomed, to think that someone had a… happier ending than mine.  
   
I gave him the barest hint of a smile. I knew he thought of it as a shy smile, but I never figured out where he got that idea from. Maybe it’s that I blended hope for his approval with uncertainty that I was giving what he wanted.  
   
It was often exactly what he wanted.  
   
I just never understood how he could think that I wouldn’t know that.  
   
None of the slaves were drugged when they were paraded before Merlin. They were all terrified, even those who were trying to be seductive. Some of them found my presence reassuring; some of them didn’t. The latter were the wiser, of course, but I wasn’t going to try to steal hope from the former.  
   
Merlin was very showy in his inspection of each potential purchase. He used Logrus as if it were the merest parlor trick. It covered Ghostwheel’s much more exacting inspections.  
   
The woman I recognized looked at Merlin with a blank but somehow angry expression. I was pretty sure she’d try hard to kill him if he gave her the slightest opening. She glanced at me and did a double take that I might not have noticed if I hadn’t been watching for some sign of recognition. She very carefully didn’t look at me after that.  
   
I wanted to tell her that I wouldn’t hurt her, that Merlin likely wouldn’t, but I wasn’t sure either was truth. I recognized her. She recognized me. We might be enemies.  
   
But surely I’d remember that?  
   
In the end, Merlin bought most of them. He had very sharp words about the two he refused. I couldn’t understand, but he sounded as if they’d tried to pass him shoddy goods.  
   
Enzal’s groveling response seemed to confirm that interpretation.  
   
I couldn’t tell whether Merlin’s anger was performative but justified or something he had invented for some other purpose. Were Lords of Chaos expected to throw tantrums? Was Merlin distracting attention from something? Would he get a better price this way? Was something else going on?  
   
I kept my face carefully blank, but I was pretty sure that, if Merlin were genuinely angry, parts of the building would come down.  
   
Merlin had all of the slaves drugged for transport except for the woman I recognized. When it came to her, he looked at me. “Do you want her drugged?”  
   
She twitched minutely at the words and turned her eyes to me.  
   
I hesitated. It made sense that she’d recognize the language we were speaking if she recognized me, but it didn’t mean she wasn’t an enemy. I met her eyes for a fraction of a second then looked at Merlin and nodded. “May I carry her?”  
   
Merlin smiled and stroked my cheek. “If you’d like. We’re leaving from here.” His smile broadened a little. “They think we can’t. I think they need to be reminded that their precautions only hold because we’re courteous.” He tilted my chin up and kissed me deeply.  
   
Then he stood and walked over to her. “You pissed someone off,” he told her. “It will be interesting to find out who.” He touched her neck and held his fingers there for several seconds.  
   
When her legs gave out, he stepped back and let her fall. “She’s aware, but she can’t move any of her voluntary muscles.”  
   
He’d used something like that on me more than once but never just by touching me. I hadn’t known he could.  
   
He moved away, giving a little wave of his fingers to indicate that I had permission to stand up and go to her. “You’ll have about three hours to explain things to her.” His expression suggested that ‘shit Merlin will do if you piss him off’ should feature high on my list. “I’ll add a room to your suite so that she has somewhere to sleep. You can sleep there, if you want, when I’m not wanting you.”  
   
I hadn’t even thought about that. I nodded. “Yes, Merlin.” I only hesitated a moment before taking the naked woman in my arms and standing again. I think, on some level, I had expected a blanket or something between us.  
   
As I straightened, Merlin said, “If you would, Ghostwheel.” That was as much warning as I got-- The woman and I were suddenly back in my prison.  
   
I had no idea where to put her down, but I also didn’t want to hold her any longer than necessary. When I’d asked to carry her, I’d thought we’d be walking out. The bed--  any part of the bedroom-- seemed like the wrong message, so I took her to the room where Merlin and I sometimes watched movies and set her in one of the chairs. Then I stripped a blanket off my bed and covered her with it.  
   
Beyond blinking, she didn’t move. I’m not sure why I expected her to.  
   
I moved the other chair so that I could look at her instead of at the screen. I looked at her for almost a minute without finding words. Finally, I said, “There are a lot of things I… don’t always remember. I know you, but I don’t know why or from where. Merlin didn’t recognize you, so that excludes some options.”  
   
I scrubbed my hands over my face and wished desperately that she were able to respond. “I don’t intend to hurt you,” I told her at last. “Not unless things… go badly between us. Merlin probably won’t touch you, not even if he’s pissed as hell with me, not even if that’s what might hurt me worst.”  
   
I made a mental note to ask Ghostwheel to make sure that her room, once she had one, was set up so with locks on both sides of the door and with soundproofing good enough that she wouldn’t hear me scream. She might guess, she might even know, but she wouldn’t be audience to it. I thought-- hoped-- Merlin would be that kind.  
   
I sighed. “Merlin won’t if you-- Don’t attack him. No matter what, just don’t. And he will probably do some really nasty shit if he thinks you’ve hurt me.” I wondered if she would understand the horror of the maze if I told her. Martin had, but Martin wouldn’t have reacted to captivity the way she had. “And he’ll keep doing it, over and over, until you can’t even think about whatever pissed him off.” I let the truth, the weight, of that show in my face. I don’t know if she saw it.  
   
“There aren’t any doors to the outside,” I told her. “Not that we could go anywhere if there were. He just doesn’t want me able to forget that, not for a second. Because, sometimes, it is about what will hurt me the worst.” I closed my eyes for a moment and made myself forget the lack of an exit. Instead, I thought about the times Merlin let me out. I’d seen a lot of his Ways over the last decade, and him taking me to other Shadows wasn’t entirely rare. Because, sometimes, it wasn’t about what would hurt me.  
   
I couldn’t think of anything else she absolutely needed to know, not that she needed to know then. She’d find out about Ghostwheel eventually, and if she was hostile, it might be better that she not realize that we were never alone.  
   
I stood and started to leave. In the doorway, I turned back. “I don’t know what name you knew me by. Merlin calls me Luke, so that’s who I am now.” I gave the room a careful once over in order to make sure the cats weren’t in there. I wasn’t entirely sure how they would react to a completely unmoving stranger. They probably wouldn’t bite or scratch, even when she didn’t pet them, but just hearing them when she couldn’t turn to look would be terrifying, and I was trying to be kind. “I have cats,” I told her. “Merlin has never harmed them, not even indirectly.”  
   
I shut the door and went to a room where she couldn’t hear me to talk to Ghostwheel.  
   
“We need to study her,” Ghostwheel said as soon as I had seated myself and said his name. “There’s enough of a tangle of power around her that I can’t read what’s going on. I don’t know if it’s her or if it’s something someone else did to her.” He hesitated. “It might be both.”  
   
I bit my lip. “Is she family?” I thought I’d remember a sister, and I’d definitely remember a daughter.  
   
“I’m not sure. Merlin’s not sure. Rafael is searching the records the slavers don’t let anyone see. There might be something there. I haven’t been able to reach Gavra or Tryphosa yet.”  
   
Gavra was Merlin’s construct/child who specialized in curses and bindings. She spent a lot of her time beyond the furthest safe edges of the Courts of Chaos. Tryphosa was the construct/child with the most skill at spotting Amber relatives regardless of whether or not they knew they were or were trying to hide it or had ever come within seven miles of the Pattern. She was difficult to locate because Dworkin had decided that she needed to be destroyed. She checked in with Ghostwheel periodically but wouldn’t answer if anyone tried to initiate contact.  
   
I wanted immediate information, but I supposed that waiting a few days wouldn’t hurt me. I turned the thought over a few times and realized that, yes, it actually could. If the mystery woman was family, the odds were heavily against Merlin leaving her here with me, and I had already started thinking about the possibility of company that wasn’t loyal to Merlin first.  
   
I looked up at the spinning wheel of light that was Ghostwheel. “Maybe she shouldn’t stay here.” Saying that was hard, harder than I’d expected.  
   
Ghostwheel took long enough responding that I knew he must be consulting with Merlin. “She’s seen you. She knows you. Merlin isn’t letting her go unless Martin thinks it’s important to.”  
   
Which meant Martin visiting soon. Wonderful. But that had been likely anyway given that Merlin had bought slaves just for him. I leaned my face into my hands. “Please,” I whispered. I knew that Ghostwheel wasn’t likely to use his influence over Merlin to make things easier for me. “I’m not sure I can deal with her being here if she might--” I shook my head.  
   
“Oh.” Ghostwheel actually sounded as if he understood. “I’m pretty sure he’d give you someone else. He’d probably enjoy taking you back and letting you pick someone out.”  
   
I wasn’t sure I could make either Ghostwheel or Merlin understand the nausea that prospect provoked. I’d only been able to face bringing this woman here because I knew her and because I wanted something from her. Merlin had to have known it wasn’t sex.  
   
“A person isn’t like a cat. If I decide I can’t live with a cat--” The thought of giving up either Profit or Loss hurt like hell. “--I can find someone else to take it.” Someone who would treat it well. What could I do with a person? Give them to Merlin? Not a chance in hell. I’d have to truly loathe them for that.  
   
“Merlin is coming your way as soon as he has the others settled.”  
   
I started a little. Somehow, I hadn’t expected Ghostwheel to speak again. “Oh.” Of course, he was. “Could we leave her until she can move and then give her clothes before we talk to her?”  
   
“Merlin wants her able to respond. I don’t think he cares about clothes.”  
   
“I do, though, and she’s mine until he takes her away.” I didn’t think my clothing would fit her. “It needn’t be much. A bathrobe even.” I tried not to sound like I was begging.  
   
I was pretty sure that I didn’t have a bathrobe to offer. For a long time, even after he finally let me wear clothes again, Merlin hadn’t let me have anything with a belt. I don’t think Ghostwheel would have let me hang myself, but I was pretty sure that wasn’t the point.  
   
Merlin took nearly an hour and a half to show up. I don’t know if he approved the bathrobe idea or if Ghostwheel decided it was harmless. Ghostwheel dumped about six robes on me and said that I’d know better than he would which would fit. I punted on that by taking all six to the room where the woman was, knocking and saying, “Clothes!” and then dropping all of them just inside the door.  
   
Merlin wanted to play a little while we waited for the woman to be able to move again, so he did. He didn’t bother with remaining human which was always terrifying because he could have as many hands, as many mouths, as many cocks as he wanted. He could block my ears or my nose without effort. He could-- Well, yes, and he did.  
   
I was grateful that he didn’t want to hear me scream. Begging, yes, and whimpers but not screaming. I’m pretty sure it was a very toned down version of what he wanted to do to one of his new acquisitions.  
   
I could only be grateful that it wasn’t going to be me. It had been me far too many times, and even if he was generally kinder now than he had been, that didn’t mean that he wanted me to enjoy it.  
   
Ghostwheel told us when the woman began to move and when she had selected and put on a bathrobe. She made no effort to leave the room, however, which surprised me.  
   
Maybe she suspected what was going on outside. Maybe we hadn’t been quite as quiet as I’d thought.  
   
Merlin let me clean up and dress before we went into the room. We took food and water in with us.  
   
The woman looked less angry and less frightened than she had. I was sure that she knew that things could still end up being very bad indeed, but she seemed to have hope now. She was sitting in Merlin’s chair.  
   
Merlin took the chair that was usually mine. He gave me no indication as to what he wanted me to do.  
   
I hesitated, but really, my only options were standing and kneeling, so I knelt next to Merlin’s chair.  
   
He was studying her, and I suspected he was using some of his powers.  
   
I bit my lip then made myself speak. “You know me, don’t you?”  
   
She nodded.  
   
“As Rinaldo?”  
   
She shook her head.  
   
“As Luke?”  
   
She shook her head again.  
   
I didn’t remember any other names I’d used, but I supposed there must have been some. I looked at the floor for a moment, so I missed what Merlin was doing.  
   
“Can you write?” Merlin held up a pen and a pad of paper.  
   
I supposed he must have used Logrus to obtain them. I just hadn’t been paying enough attention to notice.  
   
She started to tremble and shook her head. The expression on her face was clearly one of longing. Her hands opened and closed.  
   
“Does it hurt?” Merlin asked.  
   
She inhaled, held it for a moment, then nodded. She stood, squaring her shoulders, and walked over to Merlin. She held out a hand.  
   
He raised the pad in one hand and the pen in the other, offering them to her.  
   
She took the pen, almost without flinching. A split second later, it burst into flame. When she dropped it, her hand burned for another ten seconds, leaving her skin charred and blistered.  
   
“Yes,” Merlin said. “That would make writing difficult. Can you type?”  
   
She started to shake her head then shrugged.  
   
“Never tried?” Merlin studied her. “Curses can have odd loopholes if the person who made them wasn’t careful and thorough.” He touched my shoulder without looking at me. “Get a computer.”  
   
The computers I had were things I used for playing games, but they had all come with word processing software. I just didn’t use that. Writing was much more risky than any other art I might use to fill time. I didn’t trust my lies to hold if I went that way.  
   
I picked the machine that I cared least about and took all the necessary pieces back to Merlin. I was gone only a few minutes, but Merlin had continued asking questions while I was gone. I don’t know what he asked, but he looked deeply dissatisfied when I came back into the room.  
   
The woman was seated again. She cradled her burned hand in her other, and I thought I saw pain in her face.  
   
I set the hardware down. I closed my eyes for a second and took a deep breath. “Merlin--”  
   
I had his full attention.  
   
“Please. Something for the burns?”  
   
He blinked. Then he reddened just a bit.  
   
So he hadn’t even thought about it.  
   
He waved me toward the door. “Find something.”  
   
He knew as well as I did that I had nothing useful, but I supposed Ghostwheel would provide. He often did these days when Merlin left me hurting. I wasn’t sure if Merlin knew. I was afraid to ask.  
   
I came back with a more extensive burn kit than the woman’s hand currently required. I wanted to be ready if the keyboard burst into flame or exploded when she touched it. I had asked Ghostwheel to be ready to remove the computer entirely. I told him that fumes from it burning might harm us-- me and the woman at least. Merlin could shapeshift-- and he was able to verify the truth of that fairly quickly.  
   
Merlin had things set up by the time I got back but hadn’t yet let the woman touch the keyboard. He waved me toward her which I took as an order to treat her burns.  
   
She hesitated noticeably before holding out her hand.  
   
I showed her each item before I used it, even letting her sniff the ointment, and waited until she nodded acceptance. That made the whole thing take longer, but I was willing to take that time as long as Merlin allowed it.  
   
At this point, I was sure she was a relative. She wasn’t nearly worried enough about the damage to her hand. Most people would be looking at a prolonged healing process and, possibly, some degree of loss of function.  
   
I wasn’t sure if Merlin had spotted that. Then again, he was probably more suspicious about such things now than he had been in college.  
   
And he might take that out on me later.  
   
After I put down the burn treatment kit, Merlin handed me a fire extinguisher. “I have a spell ready, too.” The expression on his face told me that he wasn’t certain that this sort of fire would respond to either method for extinguishing it.  
   
The woman spent several seconds studying the keyboard and monitor before she extended a finger to touch the space bar. She didn’t put any pressure on it, and nothing at all happened. She pulled her hand back and looked at us.  
   
“Your name, if you can,” Merlin told her.  
   
She looked sad and shook her head.  
   
“Ah. Just something you’d like us to call you, then.”  
   
She nodded and seemed to consider that. She smiled and pressed the ‘h’ on the keyboard. Nothing exploded or started to burn. Her smile widened, and she added four more letters.  
   
“Harla?” Merlin sounded as if he knew he should recognize the name but didn’t.  
   
Which was pretty much how I felt.  
   
Merlin got the slightly abstracted look that generally meant he was talking to Ghostwheel privately.  
   
I distracted Harla-- or whatever her name really was-- by asking about food preferences and whether or not she wanted a chance to shower. Letting her shower would mean letting her see the bedroom, but if she hadn’t guessed my status with regard to Merlin, she hadn’t been paying any attention at all.  
   
She requested a few dishes that Merlin had told me were common in Amber and one or two things that I’d never heard of, and she wanted an immediate shower.  
   
I led her that way. “We’ll find better clothes. It’s… Well, nothing of mine or Merlin’s would fit, so it will take Merlin finding time to do it.”  
   
She nodded, but she gave most of her attention to studying the rooms we passed through.  
   
I wondered what she was seeing, what the space and the furnishings and all actually told her. As we got to the bedroom, I asked, “Did I know you when my father was alive?”  
   
She stopped, turned, and laid her unburned hand on my shoulder. Her lips moved. She shook her head with a look of frustration. Eventually, she nodded.  
   
“And after?”  
   
She nodded again then shook her head. She pulled up one of my hands and pressed it against her body as if I was pushing her away. She shrugged.  
   
I made no effort to get my hand free. “I don’t remember,” I admitted. “There’s a lot I don’t remember.”  
   
Her face went still and hard, and she looked back in the direction we’d come.  
   
“Don’t, please.” The words were the barest whisper. As if that might keep Ghostwheel from hearing. “He might still be kind to you.” I shook my head. “Nobody can leave unless he lets them, not even in the places where there are doors.” I pulled my hand free and turned away. “It’s better than it was, and it’s been so many years that… Well, he could have killed me.” He still could. I didn’t expect that he would, but he still could. “I don’t actually want to die.” Most of the time.  
   
She touched my shoulder again. Then I heard the bathroom door close.  
   
I went looking for my cats.  
   
******  
   
Merlin found me in the room where I kept all of the things I’d asked for for the cats.  
   
I sat on the floor with Loss on my lap. Profit had stretched herself out on a padded platform under a sunlamp and was pretending that nothing else existed. She was awake. I could see her eyes from where I sat. She merely didn’t currently feel that anything in the room was worth her attention.  
   
I looked up at Merlin and waited. I was pretty sure that, if he’d wanted more than to talk, he’d have summoned me rather than seeking me out.  
   
“If the name’s a hint-- and I don’t see how it couldn’t be-- she’s probably an aunt. Oberon had a wife named Harla who left behind two children, Princess Sand and Prince Delwin. There was some sort of nastiness about Harla aging faster than Oberon expected and him putting her aside in favor of a younger model.” Merlin shrugged. “Sand and Delwin left Amber in a huff and never returned. Or so the story goes… As far as I can tell, that’s what Oberon said, and nobody else saw them go or talked to them after that.”  
   
So no one would question the story. I nodded. “She can’t have been… at that place that long.” We hadn’t been gone even long enough for someone else to need to feed my cats, so the Shadow couldn’t have been a blink and hundreds of years have passed in Amber sort of place.  
   
“They could have put her in stasis of some sort.” Merlin didn’t sound at all as if he believed that. He shook his head. “That would mean she’d never have met you. She and her brother disappeared long before Patternfall.” He sat down next to me and offered his fingers to Loss before rubbing the exact spot behind her ear that she liked most.  
   
“She said she knew me before and after my father died.” She had implied that I’d pushed her away. Or was I standing in for my mother? Why would my mother have rejected any potential ally? If Harla or Sand or whoever she was had been on the border between ally and threat, that might explain it. The woman who still hadn’t emerged from my bathroom would likely not tell me.  
   
“Martin and Vialle both say that they don’t know of any member of the family having dealings with Sand. Or with Delwin, but we don’t have him in hand.”  
   
Martin and Vialle. Yes, Merlin’s way of asking if Random needed the woman free without making Random take official notice of the fact that Merlin could imprison relatives at whim. I think the unspoken agreement was that Merlin wouldn’t touch anyone Random needed unless they attacked him first and that Random would make sure they didn’t.  
   
I had no idea what Random knew or didn’t about the relationship between Martin and Merlin. I didn’t think it mattered much as long as Random didn’t try to keep them apart. Merlin hurt and angry could only mean bad things for me.  
   
And very likely bad things for Random, too.  
   
I gave Loss my full attention while I thought things through. “Will you be leaving her with me?” I said at last. I could think of many reasons why he wouldn’t-- shouldn’t-- but that didn’t necessarily change things.  
   
Merlin put his hands on my shoulders and started working some of the tension out. It was generally a good sign when he did that. It meant he wanted Merlin and Luke instead of Merlin and his fucktoy.  
   
Of course, I also hated it because I knew it wouldn’t last, because it meant I could fuck up hugely if I forgot which role I was playing. I almost never did, but it was hard.  
   
“I bought her for you. If you still want her. We knew she was likely to be dangerous anyway.” He shrugged, and I felt it through his hands on my shoulders. “It’s no harder and no easier adding rooms to this apartment than it would be to make her a new one entire.” His thumbs pressed against the back of my neck.  
   
I sighed and pushed back a little against his hands. He’d probably actually give me whatever I asked for. I just wasn’t sure I could live with any of the options. In this mood, it was unlikely that I could rely on Merlin to tell me what to do, either. “I want to know,” I admitted, “but I’m just going to forget again. We both know that.” And remembering wouldn’t make anything better or I wouldn’t have forgotten to begin with.  
   
Merlin didn’t quite sigh. His hands went still. “You’re mine. Entirely. I just… You’re still a son of Amber. You bow to me. Everyone else bows to both of us.”  
   
My laughter was nearly silent, but it made my body shake. It sounded so damned simple. When I managed to steady myself, I said, “You know I don’t have that in me. Not any more.”  
   
This time it was definitely a sigh. His hands kept working on my shoulders. “I know.” Neither of us said anything for a moment, then he asked, “Do you want that?”  
   
As if it were something he could simply give back to me. As if I wouldn’t want what he wanted because he wanted it. But there was one truth I could safely offer. “I think it would take longer getting there than it did getting here.” Assuming he wanted it real and not just me as his puppet. “How long has it been, Merlin?”  
   
Merlin didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he kissed the back of my neck. “I’m happy now, most of the time.”  
   
I’m not sure he even knew he was lying.  
   
“About thirteen years,” he went on. “Do you want a way to track time or is it easier not to know?”  
   
I shook my head. The weight of days passing was bad enough without piling them together into months and years. I kept stroking Loss, feeling her purr against my leg and my hand. “How long do cats live, Merlin?”  
   
He went still again. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “There are… things I can do, but I’m not sure they’ll still exactly be cats.”  
   
I wondered if the things he could do were the same things I knew about. Possibly not. Mother had never mentioned what she taught me changing the nature of the creature being sustained. Except in as much as killing to live changed people. Would I kill Shadowdwellers to keep Profit and Loss alive and healthy? It wasn’t even worth asking. I’d do worse than kill.  
   
And Merlin was likely to give me that much. I opened my mouth to ask.  
   
“The woman has come out of the bathroom,” Ghostwheel told us. “She’s exploring the bedroom.”  
   
I went tense then forced myself to relax.  
   
Merlin, of course, didn’t miss it. “Do you want me to stop her?”  
   
“I don’t think it’s anything she hasn’t already guessed.” I very much wanted Merlin to stop touching me, but that wasn’t something I could ask for.  
   
I must not have managed to sound as indifferent as I’d hoped to because Merlin gave my shoulders a squeeze. “I’m sorry this hurts you. She’s a fascinating puzzle, but… I wanted a gift you would enjoy.”  
   
“I would rather--” I groped for something that Merlin would like. “A picnic or a meal out in Shadow or some such excursion.” He liked those almost as much as I did. “I’m going to have less of your time, aren’t I?” Which could be good or could be terrible. I suspected terrible. “Are you going to kill me?” I hadn’t worried about that in a long time. I knew that my death was unlikely given what Merlin was currently doing, but it was the ending I expected eventually.  
   
Merlin leaned his head against mine. “It would more than half kill me to lose you, Luke. I just thought… If I’m… playing… with someone else, it might be better for you. And if I go too far with one of them, it won’t matter. I can do what I want and then come back here and be… pleasant.”  
   
Oh. I closed my eyes. I choked a little on the words, but I managed to say, “Thank you.” I shifted a bit, wanting to pull my knees to my chest and wanting not to disturb Loss.  
   
There was a sound from the doorway.  
   
Merlin and I both turned to see the woman in the doorway. She wore the same bathrobe she had before, but her hair was twisted up in a towel on top of her head.  
   
Merlin pulled away from me and stood. “I think I know who you are,” he said. “Would it be safe to use that name?”  
   
She hesitated as if considering then shook her head.  
   
Merlin inclined his head to one side. “Aunt Harla, then.”  
   
“It’s a very common word,” I observed. “Of course, you probably weren’t meant to end up with family. People speaking a different language might not be a risk.”  
   
Her expression had gone from neutral to appalled.  
   
“If you die, you don’t suffer.” I shrugged. “I wouldn’t give you that sort of out, and any sort of reaction to the word risks someone noticing and putting two and two together.”  
   
Both of them were staring at me.  
   
I looked at my cat and pretended I hadn’t said anything.  
   
“Perhaps,” Merlin said after a few seconds of silence, “we should return to the room with the computer. That would make telling your story easier.”  
   
I didn’t look up to see how she answered.  
   
“Luke? Are you coming?”  
   
It wasn’t a command. I knew the difference. I looked up at him. “Does it matter? To me, I mean.” I knew that at least half of what she said would be lies. I didn’t think it would matter which half. If she tried to hurt me, Ghostwheel would intervene.  
   
He studied me for a moment. “I suppose not.” He touched the top of my head then left the room.  
   
I curled myself around Loss and made myself look at what I was thinking. I wanted to know what she knew. And I also really, really didn’t because it wouldn’t change anything.  
   
I was pretty sure she wasn’t an enemy. That anger over Merlin’s treatment of me hadn’t been feigned or calculated. It hadn’t been anger at the realization of what might happen to her, either. I had the impression that she wasn’t nearly as afraid of Merlin as she ought to be.  
   
I supposed she’d learn.


	2. The Bad News

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Merlin POV.

“So,” I said as I closed the door behind us, “you know him. Do you know me?” If she didn’t, she must have guesses.  
   
She stopped with a careful three feet between us and turned to look at me. She wobbled her hand back and forth then shrugged.  
   
I wondered if she even cared who I was. I waved at the computer. “I think it will help if you tell me what your last news from Amber was.” I wanted to know who had cursed her, but I wasn’t sure she’d be able to tell me. She certainly knew, but had I cursed her, I’d have put that information beyond access. Just in case.  
   
I used Logrus to move Luke’s usual chair in front of the keyboard, and I sat in my usual chair.  
   
She definitely noticed the Logrus. She winced minutely and pressed her lips together as if she needed to hold something back.  
   
I wondered if I could actually make her vomit from proximity to the Logrus. Luke never had. I pushed the thought away and offered her a smile. “I thought you might like to sit.”  
   
I was pretty sure she hadn’t missed the point that I had a power I could use even here.  
   
She gave me a thin smile and sat. She raised her good hand to the keyboard, keeping her burned hand in her lap. She typed.  
   
Ghostwheel told me what she wrote. If he hadn’t, I’d have had to hover over her or to wait until she was done.  
   
 _Names dangerous. Words dangerous. Full brother. Half-brother thought dead. Two half-sisters. One thought dead. Poison. Poison. Not for you, maybe. Poison. Whose son are you?_ She rested both hands in her lap and glanced over at me.  
   
“Is it dangerous for me to use names?” ‘Full brother’ was easy enough. I really hoped that the half-brother thought dead wasn’t Brand. “If it’s not, I could list people, and you could nod when I hit the right ones.” And if I didn’t, I’d send Rafael to Amber to check the records. If there were any traces of aunts and uncles lost to memory, he would find them. That’s what I made him for.  
   
She looked at me, and I was pretty sure that she was wondering which side of whatever conflict she was describing I would take. She inhaled and exhaled twice. Then she typed again. _Whose son are you?_  
   
“I was raised in Chaos by my mother and step-father.” I wasn’t sure I wanted to try to explain the complexities of my relationship with Helgrim and Sawall and the Courts in general. “My mother is Benedict’s granddaughter, at some remove.”  
   
She didn’t relax.  
   
“As far as Amber goes, I’m more than content with Random on the throne. If something happened to him, I’d put everything I have behind Martin. Assuming he wanted the throne. I don’t actually understand why anyone would.” I met her eyes and held them. “My loyalty is to people, specific people. Amber--” I made a tossing away gesture. “I don’t actually give a fuck about Amber as a place. I don’t understand why all of you keep fighting over it. I understand what Brand wanted a hell of a lot better. I understand it, and I’m really damned happy that Caine put an arrow through his throat before he could get much further along.”  
   
She glanced at the door.  
   
What? Oh, yes. “Luke and I don’t talk about his parents. It’s what he did, not what they did.” Though what he did came out of what they did. I doubted he remembered that now, but I hadn’t forgotten.  
   
She studied me for almost a minute then turned back to the computer and typed three question marks.  
   
I bared my teeth at the back of her head. When she looked at me, I said, “He imprisoned me, took my powers, and tortured me.”  
   
Her unbandaged hand clenched.  
   
“His mother did, too.” I made the words as hard and precise as I could. “I haven’t told him she’s dead, but he guessed. He’s forgotten, mostly, as long as nothing makes him think about her. She doesn’t deserve that he remember her.” Not given what she did to him. Not given what she did to me.  
   
One corner of her mouth turned up. It was a little bitter to be amusement. She typed again. _His mother wouldn’t let me take him. After. Even my brother wouldn’t have guessed he wasn’t mine._  
   
I wondered if it was true. It could have been. It also could have been a complete lie. I hadn’t figured out yet how to build something that could look through time, so I had no way to check. I shrugged. “Jasra wanted revenge more than she wanted her son alive.” I wondered if Sand would see the truth of that in my face. “Luke… was too young to know the risks.” I let my expression go just a little bleak. “I’d already broken him beyond recognizing when I found that part out. I just assumed he was my age or even Martin’s. That he’d understood the dangers of fucking with a Lord of Chaos.”  
   
I stood. “The brother thought dead-- Is it Caine?”  
   
She shook her head.  
   
Well, there was that. I didn’t want to think of Luke and Caine meeting. “Brand?” Brand would be worse than Caine.  
   
She shook her head.  
   
I hesitated. Corwin hadn’t actually told me the names of all of his dead brothers. “My grandfather had two older brothers.” What were their names? Corwin had said, but I couldn’t remember. It hadn’t been important.  
   
She nodded.  
   
Well, fuck.  
   
I’m sure that showed in my face because she gave me a smile that was all sharp edges, that said that she would work with me if she had to but she’d be damned if she liked me one little bit. I smiled back. “Is the other one at least actually dead?”  
   
She shrugged as if to say ‘your guess is as good as mine.’ Lovely.  
   
“Does Benedict know?” If he did and hadn’t told Random (who would have told Martin who would have told me), that meant he’d chosen to side with his brother. Which likely meant that my Ways would come under attack soon. “Ghostwheel, full defenses, full stealth. Warn the children. Benedict knows where to find us.” And he probably had plans for dealing with Ghostwheel. He might not know about the others. I hoped he didn’t know about the others.  
   
Ghostwheel could protect himself. I had to believe that.  
   
She didn’t react to my words. Probably, she had no idea about Benedict.  
   
Ghostwheel didn’t say anything out loud. Instead, he manifested visibly for about three seconds then vanished.  
   
Her eyes widened almost imperceptibly before her expression flattened again. She turned to the keyboard again. _Who is your father?_  
   
I’d wondered if she’d noticed that I never answered that one. “If you don’t know that, you’ve been out of touch for a long time.”  
   
 _I haven’t cared. Not since Patternfall._  
   
Which implied she had cared then. Had she loved Brand? If she had, why hadn’t she been at the Courts at the end? Brand had stood alone. Luke had been too young, and Jasra had needed to stay with Luke. I’d just assumed there hadn’t been anyone else.  
   
“I’ve only met my father twice,” I told her. “I’m not sure he’s relevant.” I didn’t want to tell her. I wasn’t sure why, so I looked at that more closely.  
   
Her eyes narrowed. _Present tense. Not dead then._  
   
I shrugged. “Half-sisters… I don’t have many names for the dead ones, only Deirdre.”  
   
She nodded, and my heart sank. Anything that climbed out of the Abyss probably bore little resemblance to what had fallen in.  
   
“Does she… look like herself?”  
   
She wobbled her hand back and forth. _She is disappointed that our father is dead. Very disappointed._  
   
I shrugged. “One good thing to come out of that mess.” As far as I could tell, my father had been the only one to mourn Oberon. Possibly Dworkin had, too, but Dworkin had held Oberon as an infant. That no doubt made a difference. Corwin’s response had always puzzled me. “Random is a much better person and, most likely, a better king.”  
   
She frowned, and I was certain she didn’t believe me.  
   
I smiled because her belief was irrelevant. “Random got almost no attention from his father, and he spent enough time being less powerful than those around him to have some empathy. He’s also… beyond lucky in his wife.”  
   
Her expression told me that I hadn’t convinced her.  
   
I shrugged. “The other half-sister-- Fiona?” There were only three options that I knew of, so I started with the one that would surprise me least.  
   
She shook her head.  
   
I’m sure surprise showed on my face. The other two seemed so very unlikely. Aunt Flora was heavily invested in the status quo, and Aunt Llewella loved Martin and liked Vialle. I narrowed my eyes. “I’d suspect that I was meant to find you, but I can’t make that work, logically. I’d have passed you by if not for Luke.” And, if I’d been meant to find her, I’d have expected some sort of trap in the curse, something to let my enemies find their way into my Ways.  
   
I shook my head. “I’m missing too many pieces.” I weighed my options. The fourth member of the cabal was either my favorite aunt or Martin’s. I gave myself a few seconds then said softly, “Llewella?”  
   
She nodded.  
   
Damn. I wondered if there was a way to keep Martin from finding out. Probably, but only if I was willing to lie to him forever. I considered the options. “It has to be because of Deirdre. I’m sure your brother is charming, but I can’t see him talking her into it. Grandfather’s older brothers… Well, they were officially dead a long time before Llewella was born.”  
   
Sand bit her lip then nodded.  
   
“Do all four of them even want the same thing?” Somehow, I doubted it.  
   
She laughed without making a sound. It was kind of eery.  
   
“Yeah, I didn’t think so.” I turned my back on her, secure in the knowledge that, if she attacked, Ghostwheel could stop her. “I will try to break the curse on you. It’s as much because I want to know more about it as anything else. I have allies who are quite good at that sort of thing; I’ll ask them if I need to.”   
   
I had to have some time to think about the quartet of enemies she’d identified. Telling Martin led inevitably to telling Random which probably led to Random demanding that I step out of the shadows. Assuming Random understood what my children could do.  
   
It was pretty certain that no one else in the family did. No, not entirely true-- Dworkin saw it. He just didn’t realize how many of them there were. He’d met two. Ghostwheel had been an amusing aberration. Tryphosa had somehow seemed an obvious threat. I wasn’t sure how the ability to see potential for power in people was so very threatening, but…  
   
Dworkin probably wanting to kill me was the reason I was never going back to Amber, the real reason why I had made finding my Ways as difficult as I could manage. I wouldn’t fight Dworkin unless I was certain I would win.  
   
Sand started typing again. _Father and grandfather used our children. Worse than death._  
   
I started and turned back to look at her.  
   
Her face was set in grim lines. _Sister thought dead lost three that way. Were used to power things Father could use as agents, as tools, as slaves. Died when he did._ She turned to look at me. I think she was trying to see whether or not I understood.  
   
I did. I didn’t want to, but I did. Oberon had used infants of his blood to make things like-- and very much unlike-- Ghostwheel and my other children. He’d tied their lives to his. He’d-- “If he weren’t dead, I’d introduce him to my children and let them do as they pleased.” I summoned a glass of water and used some to clean the acid from my mouth. I spat it on the floor, not caring at all about Luke’s carpet.  
   
No wonder Dworkin was afraid of me and my children.  
   
And some of my children might choose to side with Deirdre entirely based on that. Most of them liked Martin, even loved him, but I could see why they might want to burn Amber to the ground. I didn’t think they’d try to destroy the Pattern. Too many of them drew on it for power.  
   
I cleared my throat. “I’m surprised, given that, that all of my aunts didn’t side with Brand.” I summoned a second glass of water and offered it to her. I wasn’t going to ask her how many she’d lost.  
   
She accepted the water and drank.  
   
“Would you like something stronger? I’ve got a number of things that can get even people like us shitfaced.”   
   
She looked tempted but shook her head.  
   
I shrugged and sat. “This changes things and really, really doesn’t. You’ve seen Luke. You know who he is. I’ve taken pains not to have people know he exists at all. I can protect him here, probably, but I’d have to take steps that I don’t want to if someone from the family came after him.” I studied her face, trying to judge if she understood.  
   
She clenched her unburned hand then slowly forced it open. She didn’t try to tell me that she’d keep my secrets.  
   
I was grateful for that much. “We might have time, or we might not. Time here flows much faster than it does in Amber.” But we both knew there were other places than Amber, an infinite number of them. “I can stop Llewella. I can probably stop your brother.” Someone had to have a Trump of him. “The other two… I don’t think I’d dare bring Deirdre here.” I might not be able to hold her at all. There was no guessing how the Abyss had changed her. “Does she-- Does she have any sort of effect on her surroundings? Just by being there, I mean.”  
   
She looked startled enough that I thought I’d guessed correctly. If I brought Deirdre into my Ways, my Ways would change. Part of the challenge of keeping Ways in Chaos was in keeping the Abyss out.  
   
“Yes. I’ll not invite that in.” If I took Llewella and Delwin, then, with Sand and Dalt, I’d have four of my father’s siblings plus Luke, rather a large portion of the family. I wasn’t sure that that wouldn’t make the rest of the family come after me. I wasn’t sure it could be hidden. I took a deep breath. “I suppose I was going to have to play the game eventually.”  
   
I shapeshifted a hand so that I could play with flame. I wasn’t good at meditation, but watching small flames helped me clear my mind.  
   
Sand didn’t interrupt me. She watched me unwaveringly, but she didn’t move at all.  
   
“It would be really convenient for me if Dworkin died.” I hadn’t ever said it that bluntly before, but it was true. “I just don’t see a way to let the cabal you’ve described do that without sacrificing people I… love.” I’d admitted to loving Martin, but I hadn’t considered that what I felt for Random and Vialle and Flora might qualify. I had no particular attachment to Julian or Gerard. I’d be mildly sorry if they suffered or died, but… I wouldn’t do anything about it. “I don’t give a fuck about Amber. I’m attached to the continued existence of the Pattern, but…” I shrugged.  
   
She turned back to the keyboard. _I can’t make you do anything._ Her expression when she looked back at me told me that was bitter knowledge.  
   
“Taking action also risks people I care about.” The possibility that any of my children might die hurt more than anything had in a long time. “Ghostwheel,” I said softly, “each of you is going to have to decide whether or not this is your fight.”  
   
Ghostwheel manifested again. He spun for several seconds before he spoke. “If they attack us, it will be.”  
   
I tried to figure out if that meant he thought I should make sure they did attack us. Ghostwheel was more capable of deceit than he had been years ago. “It’s the task of the parent to protect the children. Not the other way around. I’m pretty sure that no one could track any of you if you decided you didn’t want to deal with that part of the family.” Dworkin had never found Tryphosa, after all, and he’d definitely been looking. I looked down at my hands. “This is about Dworkin and who rules Amber, about which members of my father’s family survive.”  
   
“Martin.” Ghostwheel’s tone told me he understood that part of things.  
   
“A few others, too, but yes, mostly Martin.”  
   
“You could bring him here.”  
   
“That would be as great a betrayal as trapping you here.” Martin would never forgive me. He would understand, but he wouldn’t forgive me.  
   
Sand moved just enough to draw my eye. When I looked, I realized that was deliberate. She looked at Ghostwheel and then at me. She raised her eyebrows.  
   
“Ghostwheel, this is your great-aunt. Her name is the same as the stuff Luke likes to dig in at the beach. I’m not sure addressing her by name is safe for her.” I met Sand’s eyes with more than a little challenge. “Ghostwheel is my oldest child. I love them all, but Ghostwheel is better at understanding what I can and can’t do and where the disconnects are between how I see the world and how he and the rest of them do.”  
   
“I’m a lot older than the others,” Ghostwheel said, “and, when I started, there were no others like me. I had no one to talk to but biologicals.” He paused a moment then added, “You’re all very, very weird, Great-Aunt S.”  
   
Calling her ‘S’ didn’t make her die or damage her in any way that I could see. “I suppose Aunt S is as good a name as any.”  
   
She shrugged and didn’t take her eyes off of Ghostwheel.  
   
“I can’t speak for my children’s children--” Ghostwheel hadn’t told me that I had grandchildren, but I’d have been beyond surprised if none of my construct children tried to make more like themselves. “--but nothing I’ve helped give life to required the sacrifice of any other life. I’d also be very surprised if most of them didn’t outlive me.”  
   
“We probably will,” Ghostwheel said, “but we’re going to try to keep you around anyway.” His tone was dry.  
   
Sand started laughing silently.  
   
I smiled then shook my head. “I’m going to warn Martin which means warning Random. Beyond that… You all are going to have to make your own decisions. Individually. I don’t want anyone pressured into unanimity.” I hesitated. “I just ask, if anyone decides to join some other faction-- No. Just, please tell me.” I didn’t like the thought of my children fighting each other, and I knew that I could never bear to kill any of them no matter what it cost me. “And all of you choosing to walk away would probably be the most sensible thing.”  
   
“Except for Dworkin.”  
   
“Yes.” I sighed. “I’m pretty sure he wants all of you dead and me, too, for making you.” And I was pretty sure that I couldn’t persuade Random to abandon Dworkin. Dworkin was too powerful an ally if Random was going to be fighting for survival. “I haven’t wanted to risk any of you that way.”  
   
Ghostwheel laughed. “I know. _We_ know. You only go for sure things. It’s kind of cute.” He waited a few seconds to let me think about that. “We actually are ready, you know. For any of it.”  
   
“I didn’t want you to have to be.” The words came out before I could stop them, and I looked at Sand. I hadn’t wanted her to see that weakness in me.  
   
She was studying me with narrowed eyes.  
   
I was pretty sure she was trying to decide whether or not she could manipulate me. I met her eyes and held them. “That’s a really terrible idea,” I told her. “You have some protection from me right now because of Luke, but it’s damned thin.”  
   
“And Merlin is your protection against us.” Ghostwheel’s tone was beyond frigid. “Things can always get worse.”  
   
She raised her eyebrows as if she doubted us. She gave me a very definitely challenging look.  
   
I was pretty sure she wasn’t stupid enough not to know what she was risking, so I wondered what she thought she could get. I also wondered what it would take to make her regret the choice and if it would take longer to break her than it had Luke. “Don’t be a fool,” I said softly. “I am exactly that sort of monster, and you would certainly not enjoy it.”  
   
I couldn’t tell if she believed me, if she understood. “It will not make me fond of you.”  
   
Her face was a smiling mask. The flow of her breathing was a little too steady to be genuine calm.  
   
Was I going to?  
   
She reached up and pulled her robe low on one shoulder. I could see the curve of her breasts where the robe parted.  
   
Whatever she wanted was apparently worth the obvious risks. Maybe she thought that, if I fucked her, I’d leave Luke alone.  
   
I stood. I smiled at her. “You’ll have a little time to consider.” Martin was more important than Sand, possibly more important than Luke. I gave her a slight bow. “I will return.”


	3. Ghostwheel Doesn't Tell Merlin Everything

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ghostwheel POV.

I continued to visually manifest after Merlin left Sand otherwise alone. “It might work,” I told her, “but he’s very, very careful when he’s with women, and he is a shapeshifter.”

She looked at me sharply and frowned. 

I suspected it was the usual frustration that humans had over not being able to judge my body language or facial expression. Sometimes, it made them forget that I might have opinions and desires of my own. Merlin remembered that part. He just forgot that, while keeping him happy and safe might be my top priority, I was capable of paying attention to dozens of things at once.

He had made me and my siblings without the limits that bound him.

“Benedict does not appear to be preparing to attack anyone.” I wanted to see how she’d react to that. “He knows how to hide such things from me, but he’s never met any of the others.” Benedict might have extrapolated from my existence to the possibility of others. He might not have. 

Most of Merlin’s Amber relatives were unimaginative that way. Even Dworkin seemed to think there were only two of us.

“You’re right that he’d do anything to protect one of his children.” I would give her that much. “And that that protection might extend to you if you were the mother.” Not for the first time, I wondered how Luke and Merlin would interact now if I’d said I was comfortable with Merlin having more biological children. Was I still uncomfortable with that?

Would any of the others care?

She turned to her keyboard. _What are you?_

I didn’t answer. I didn’t leave, but I didn’t answer. Instead, I dropped a device in her lap.

She jumped, and it fell. I caught it and moved it to the table next to her.

“That’s portable. The keyboard manifests when you push the middle button on the side. The battery ought to last about ten hours. Just in case you want to talk to Luke in some other room than this.”

She touched the device tentatively then set her jaw and pressed the button to produce the keyboard. Her good hand hovered over it for several seconds before she extended one finger to press a key.

It took me longer than it should have to realize she wasn’t sure whether or not her curse would react badly to a new method of communicating.

_Why?_

“Because I’m not petty.”

She raised her eyebrows.

“Merlin loves Luke.” I was a little surprised I had to spell it out. “A child with Luke might help you as much as one with Merlin and be more possible and less… painful.” I sighed to let her know that Luke’s current state saddened me. What I felt was more complicated than sadness, but she didn’t need to know that. “But it will only happen if you tell him why. Explicitly. It’s been a long time since he had any desire for sex.”

Her eyes had gone wide somewhere in the middle of my speech.

Was she only now starting to be afraid of me? Merlin’s relatives really were stupid.

Which meant I had better spell out some other things. “Merlin doesn’t know that. Luke doesn’t want him to.”

_You don’t want him to know._

So she wasn’t entirely stupid. I wondered if she would ever realize that a child might be an even better thing for Luke than for her. She might realize that I really didn’t have a reason to care what happened to her.

“Better for him. Better for Luke.”

She closed her eyes for a moment and nodded.

I didn’t bother to put menace into my tone. “If you hurt Luke, it’s not Merlin you’ll have to worry about, not immediately. I’m always watching.” I was pretty sure that, if Sand upset Luke, he’d go to great lengths not to let Merlin know. Luke, as he had become, was much kinder than any of Merlin’s other relatives. He hadn’t been, before.

She nodded again.

I wondered if it would occur to her to try to hold Luke hostage. He was much more vulnerable that way than Merlin was, and Merlin might let the pair of them go rather than risk Luke’s death.

Getting them back would be trivial. If I couldn’t find them, one of my siblings could. Shadow was infinite, so there had to be places none of us could reach, but finding that sort of refuge would not be easy.

Sand might manage it if she abandoned Luke, but, if she did that, whether Luke was harmed or not, Merlin would never stop hunting her. Would she realize?

The rest of us wouldn’t stop, either. All of my construct siblings talked to Luke from time to time and liked him. I’m not sure all of them realized what life with Merlin was like for Luke, but they all understood what was likely to happen if Luke left the Ways unaccompanied.

Luke would be very lucky if Martin found him before Mandor did.

I wished, for a moment, that I could communicate my thoughts just by having Sand see me frown. I could bring in a peripheral and work through that, but humans tended to forget what I actually was when I did that. I really didn’t want Sand to forget.

“There isn’t much Merlin wouldn’t give Luke,” I said more gently. “Luke just doesn’t think to ask.” More, I suspected, because Luke couldn’t think of anything he wanted apart from the things Merlin wouldn’t give than because Luke didn’t know.

But it was hard to tell with Luke. 

Dalt was much easier to read. My siblings talked to him, too, at least as much as they talked to Luke. At first, Dalt had been polite because he suspected what I could do to him. Later, after he realized that they were babies, he tried to help them understand what life was like for biologicals, including those without power. 

I think he realized what monsters we could become and that I wanted us not to.

I left more of my attention focused on Sand and Luke than I would have if Luke had been alone. That still wasn’t much, but it should be enough that I could intervene in under a second, local time, if anything happened that I didn’t like.

It was time to consult with my siblings.

I considered leaving Clayre and Gramble out because they were both so young, just barely twenty, and because including them meant talking at their speed rather than at the speeds the rest of us preferred. But, if we went to war, the two of them were our weakness. Mandor wouldn’t hesitate if he thought we were a threat.

And, really, we were a threat. We just didn’t want anything that he had. Except for Clayre and Gramble.

There were also things Clayre and Gramble didn’t know, things that Merlin didn’t ever want them to know. I had decided, without consulting Merlin, that my construct siblings did need to know. If nothing else, they needed to realize that what they thought they saw biologicals doing wasn’t necessarily what those biologicals were actually doing. They needed to know that biologicals would lie to them and try to use any ignorance to control them.

Clayre and Gramble needed a different set of warnings.

In the end, we had two simultaneous meetings. The twins weren’t aware enough of what we were to know that we could do that, not yet. I expected that, in another few years, it would occur to them. I wasn’t sure how angry they’d be.

There was also-- and I had been avoiding this-- the fact that some of the younger construct siblings didn’t really think that Merlin’s biological children were anything but near intelligent pets. Merlin was the only biological they quite accepted as an equal, and that might not last.

Had I robbed Clayre and Gramble of the sort of support I now had? They had Sawall and could have Amber, but that really only meant being used by the people they relied on. I protected them from that as I could, but if I went too far in that direction, they might lose what they had.

Also, I had to let them make choices, and some of those were going to be mistakes. I wouldn’t let them suffer too much for those, but I also wouldn’t remove all consequences.

Clayre and Gramble were really more my children than Merlin’s. He hadn’t seen them since we took them from Jasra. They didn’t understand that. I had told them that, now that their mother was dead, they reminded Merlin of her in painful ways. As I had hoped, they took that in a happier way than the way in which it was actually true.

I sent out a call for my construct siblings. So far as I knew, none of them had succeeding in reproducing. The problem they had with efforts in that direction was wanting to make children who were different from themselves-- the way Merlin and I had-- without actually understanding what that meant. They also didn’t realize that part of being a parent was letting go.

So they created and then destroyed without ever getting close to what they wanted. None of them asked me for advice. They had to know I was watching, but they didn’t ask.

Not counting Clayre and Gramble, there were twenty one of us. Merlin had designed each of the younger ones to be suited for a particular task that might be useful to him. That was only one aspect of each construct, however, and all were free to choose not to carry out that task. Or not to do it for Merlin.

I encouraged exploration of those tasks simply as a starting point for interacting with the universe. So much of reality swarmed with biologicals, and it was still possible that one or more of Merlin’s relatives would think to do what he had.

Or what Dworkin and Oberon had. That seemed much more likely.

I was pretty sure that my siblings would be more appalled by the enslavement and the eventual murder of the constructs rather than by the use of infants to create them. I’m not sure that any of them had realized how easily Merlin could have made them as slaves instead of as children.

It had taken me centuries to understand.


	4. Breaking the News to Random

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Merlin's POV.
> 
> Random's probably only in this chapter, so I haven't tagged for him. I will if he turns up in a second chapter as more than a passing reference.

When I left Sand, I spent some time walking along a mountain path. No one else was likely to go there, so I could expect to be alone. I wanted that because I was pretty sure I’d hurt anyone I happened upon just then. I needed to Trump Martin, but I couldn’t quite bring myself to.  
   
I didn’t know what the hell I was going to tell him about Llewella.  
   
In the end, I avoided the question by Trumping Random, instead. He was somewhere in Arden when he answered. Judging by the way he was moving, he was on a horse but not a horse going particularly fast.  
   
“We need to talk privately,” I told him.  
   
He raised an eyebrow. “Ghostwheel--?”  
   
“Not enough for this.” I wasn’t going to tell him that Ghostwheel might not be on our side for this one. I bit my lip, “And it needs to be you. You can decide what Martin needs to know.” I hoped Random wouldn’t call me on the buck passing I was doing. “I can’t safely come to Amber, but I’m willing to meet you elsewhere. Your choice of location.” I very much wanted just to bring Random to my Ways, but I was pretty sure that he didn’t trust me that much.  
   
He studied my face for a moment. “A few seconds,” he said.  
   
I waited while he stopped his horse and dismounted. When he offered me his hand, I was so surprised that I hesitated. “Are you sure?”  
   
He smiled without all that much humor. “I actually do understand what you’re capable of.”  
   
Ah. I nodded and took his hand, pulling him through. “At least the weather’s good here,” I said as I let go of his hand. “There’s a decent sized flat spot ahead, and I can bring in chairs and drinks or whatever.” I squared my shoulders. “Or if you’d rather be inside to get bad news…”  
   
“How bad?” He didn’t look at me, just scanned the surrounding mountainside.  
   
I raked my fingers through my hair. “Possibly Patternfall bad. Possibly less so. My source is probably lying about some things. I don’t see how it would serve her, but that doesn’t mean it wouldn’t.” I started walking, just assuming he’d follow. Where else was he going to go? “I have people checking up on her story, but I will need help from you for some parts.”  
   
I had expected to have more time to figure out a story for how I found Sand, but I supposed it wouldn’t matter. “Ghostwheel, we’ll want something to sit on, please.”  
   
Random didn’t say anything until we were actually seated. “Patternfall bad?” He sounded like he hoped I was wrong.  
   
I hoped I was wrong, too. “How well do you know Sand and Delwin?”  
   
He hesitated. “They’re young enough that I’m not sure any of us knew them. No. That’s not true. Julian and Llewella probably do. They were both… in the area more than any of the rest of us. At that point in time, anyway.”  
   
“Sand is my source. She’s under a very nasty curse that makes communication challenging. We were lucky that whoever cursed her was a little too specific about the details.”  
   
“A loophole.” He nodded. “Can you break the curse?”  
   
“I don’t know yet.” I wasn’t going to tell Random that I might not even try. I had a suspicion that Sand, once released from the curse, might have more resources than Dalt did. And less hesitation about destroying the world she was trapped in. “She says that there’s a cabal of four of your siblings, including her brother, that will be coming after Amber. If she’s telling the truth… Well, she said it’s Deirdre, Delwin, one of Grandfather’s older brothers, and… Llewella.”  
   
Random made a sound as if I’d gut punched him. I didn’t look to see what his face might tell me. After several seconds, he said, “I see why you don’t want to tell Martin.”  
   
“I considered just… removing her from the equation. Out of all of them, she’d be easiest. I don’t have a Trump of Delwin or of either of Grandfather’s brothers, so finding them would take longer. Deirdre… I think she’s much changed. The Abyss would do that.” I looked at Random directly. “If what I fear is true, I probably couldn’t hold her. Shadow itself is likely to dissolve slowly wherever she is.”  
   
“No point in warning them that you could.” Random’s tone was very dry.  
   
No point denying it. “Yes.”  
   
“What do they want? Apart from my head?”  
   
“I’m not sure they care about you at all except that you’re in the way. From what Sand said, they probably want different things. Deirdre and Llewella mainly want to kill Dworkin, and… they have cause. Do you know that much?”  
   
He sighed. “Vialle told me. Llewella told her.” There was a thread of grief in his voice. “I suspect… My brothers and I will never know if we had children. I-- Dworkin accepts me as King of Amber, but he’s made it clear that that doesn’t mean I can stand against him.” He cleared his throat. “I’m pretty sure I can’t.”  
   
And he might not be able to stand against this threat without Dworkin. That complicated things.  
   
“My children…” How should I explain it? “I don’t make decisions for them, and, well, Dworkin dead would be much safer for them. I just haven’t been sure… He hasn’t managed to find me or any of them, so we haven’t needed to decide.” I started playing with flames on my fingertips. I needed to fidget somehow, and I couldn’t think of anything else. “I also… I won’t have any of them forced to follow my allegiances. I stand with you, in spite of Dworkin; I don’t know whether any of my children will do likewise.” Ghostwheel almost certainly would, but I wasn’t going to promise on his behalf.  
   
“I told Julian and Caine. I wasn’t sure Gerard would-- Well, I didn’t want him getting himself killed. One of the others may have told him. I don’t know.”  
   
“You can’t have told Martin.” Because Martin would have told me. I was sure of it.  
   
“I thought Llewella had. Or Vialle.” Random stood and walked to the edge of the clearing where he stood, looking down at the precipitous drop to the river far below. “Welcome to Amber. You’re Crown Prince, and some asshole is going to enslave your children, so don’t have any. I couldn’t say that.”  
   
I couldn’t have said it either, so I didn’t argue. “I don’t know if Benedict knows.”  
   
“About Dworkin?”  
   
“About his brother.” That seemed like a safer topic. “Were they close?”  
   
“It was before my time,” he answered. “A long time before. Benedict never talked about them, and I was too much in awe to ask. I’m not sure most people in Amber even remember that Benedict had brothers.”  
   
I closed my eyes for a moment. “I’d rather not risk talking about this with Benedict. Not yet. Is there anyone else who might have Trumps of those two? Anyone who isn’t Dworkin?”  
   
He sighed. “Corwin and Eric and Deirdre were most likely to, but even they might not have. Eric was still a child when they… died. Or whatever happened. I’m not sure Deirdre was even born.” He was silent for a moment. “There are a few places I can look. Their mother’s family still exists. Possibly they have something. I’m going to have to… look at them closely anyway.  
   
“I do have a Trump of Delwin, though,” he went on. “Dworkin made sure I had one of every living relative known at the time.” He gave me a sharp look. “Even Rinaldo. I don’t know how Dworkin knew, but he did. He just didn’t tell me who Rinaldo was. I worked that part out later.”  
   
Oh. My chest felt tight.  
   
“Martin didn’t tell me. He mentioned killing Jasra and who she had been and who her allies were. He mentioned you having children in the Courts who might want the Pattern some day. He didn’t, quite, tell me that those two things were connected.” Random’s eyes on me felt like hooks pulling me apart. “It occurred to me that your best friend in college-- Well, Flora confirmed what he looked like. If she’d been keeping the sort of close eye on you that Caine expected--” He shrugged.  
   
I wasn’t going to explain Luke to Random. I met Random’s eyes. “No one touches him. I won’t let him leave, so there’s no risk.”  
   
We both knew that wasn’t true.  
   
“Even if I die, Ghostwheel will hold him.”  
   
“I can’t make you do anything.” Random sounded calmly resigned. “I’ve known that for a very long time.”  
   
“I’m sorry.”  
   
“No, you’re not.” His laugh didn’t contain much humor, but he also didn’t sound angry. “You got here faster than I expected, but you were always going to, weren’t you? Once you’d created Ghostwheel, I mean.”  
   
“Very likely.” I looked at my hands. “I don’t think I’d have realized the-- the power of it, not until something… that terrible happened to make me. Ghostwheel having the protections he did was more accident than anything. The others-- I won’t have them used without their consent. Not even by me.”  
   
He made a noise that I took as meaning he understood. “Fiona thinks that the Pattern will survive if Dworkin dies, but that’s as much speculation as her belief that your father’s Pattern would mean the end of everything if it was one of two.”  
   
And she’d been wrong about that.  
   
I shrugged. “Some prices are too high.” I’d leave it to him to decide what price I meant. I picked up some dry pine needles and burned them one by one. “Dalt has been becoming blunter over the years about offering me fealty in exchange for release. I think he understands how hard it would be to run, but…” I closed my hand on the flame, extinguishing it. “I hadn’t seen how he might be useful before now.”  
   
“You jump around like a drop of water on a hot skillet.”  
   
“My mind does, yes.” I opened my hand and let the ashes fall. “I used to hide it better. I simply don’t give a fuck now.” I gave a small laugh. “I somehow don’t think that this is what Caine was worried about when he sized me up as a threat.”  
   
“No.” Random voice was arid. “You’re an entirely new and unimagined sort of threat.”  
   
I changed the subject. “Corwin’s in the Courts somewhere. There are at least a dozen children in different Houses with the potential to walk his Pattern.” I wasn’t going to mention that I’d seriously considered abducting every last one of them. I still wasn’t sure I wouldn’t, shouldn’t. “Mother has Grayswandir.” Which was as close as I was going to come to saying that I was certain she had him.  
   
Random didn’t say anything at all for at least a minute. “That is… politically inconvenient.”  
   
“I should have realized sooner. Controlling Corwin means controlling his Pattern which means having a power to answer Amber.” I had grown up in the Courts. I really should have guessed immediately. I glanced at Random.  
   
He had closed his eyes and let his head fall back so that he faced the sky. He took several deep breaths.  
   
“I’m not sure it will actually work, not long term,” I offered. “Those families are not prepared to give my siblings the level of political power that they will demand. Only two Houses have put theirs in the line of succession for control of the House. The others have chosen mothers of… minor status and power. For most of those Houses… Well, the best case for their survival is that my siblings simply walk away.” Because shitting on people didn’t make them loyal or reliable. Even I knew that.  
   
“You’re just full of really good news.” He sounded more tired than angry.  
   
“If I start taking the children, you will certainly be blamed.” Except by Mandor. I didn’t want to break with Mandor. I was going to have to eventually, but I really didn’t want to. One of my siblings was Mandor’s child.  
   
And Mandor might tell Mother I was responsible. Then I’d lose Mother, too.  
   
“I think,” I added, “that I’m moving the pieces around in hopes that I can use one problem to crack one of the others.”  
   
“I can’t leave Corwin there.” Random fixed his eyes on me. His expression was not that of a king making a reasoned decision. He was clearly a man thinking about a brother he loved being tortured.  
   
I turned away and looked off into the distance. “Clayre and Gramble are twenty now. They’ve both survived the Logrus. I… haven’t spoken to them since before they were two.” I’d looked in on them just to be sure that they were well. “If I break with Mother, I’m not sure what will happen to them. I don’t think she’ll try to get them to kill me, but I could see her trying to get them to kill you. She might think that Martin would be more… malleable as King of Amber.”  
   
Random’s laugh was long and heartfelt.  
   
When he stopped laughing, I said, “Would it make sense for you-- or Vialle or Martin-- to invite them to visit Amber?”  
   
“I invited your brothers to Amber.”  
   
And they never came. “I don’t think either of them knew.” Mother had lost me. She probably had realized that letting Jurt or Despil go to Amber would mean losing them as well. I took a moment to consider. “Perhaps… Vialle could invite them after having heard about them from Martin and having asked me about them? I can provide Trumps of them both, so she could ask them directly and let them ask Mother.” Mother might not realize she was being manipulated. She held Vialle in contempt as someone who ought to have been culled in infancy and who was simply lucky to be pretty. Mother was wise enough not to say that where anyone from Amber could hear, but the opinion was widely held in the Courts.  
   
I sometimes thought about how surprised those people would look when Vialle stood toe to toe with them and took them down without mercy.  
   
Even more surprised than they looked when I did it. I allowed myself the briefest flicker of a smile.  
   
I’m not sure how much of what I was thinking Random guessed at, but when he spoke again, he said, “Send Dalt to spy on Delwin and… the others.” He stood and stretched then looked down at me. “Any chance of speaking to my sister?”  
   
I didn’t want to let him. I’m pretty sure he already knew that. I sighed and took a few seconds to steel myself. “She was allied with Brand.” The ground was suddenly fascinating. “Lu-- Rinaldo recognized her. I wouldn’t have bought her otherwise. Her Pattern imprint was completely suppressed.”  
   
When I glanced at Random, his face was carefully neutral.  
   
“I’m pretty sure,” I went on, “that she’d… take steps against me if I gave her the opportunity. She says she offered to pretend he was hers after-- After.” I took a deep breath, held it for three seconds, then exhaled. “Damned if I understand why Brand stood alone at the end. Rinaldo was thirteen, and I suppose Jasra needed to stay with him. Sand, though, and Dalt-- Where were they?”  
   
“Possibly in Amber.” Random sounded distant. “I never fully understood why Brand was at the Courts when only Gerard was guarding the Pattern. Once Dad died repairing the damned thing, they could have used Gerard to destroy it again. They were probably waiting for Brand to tell them he was ready.”  
   
I nodded because that made a kind of horrible sense. I still didn’t understand why Sand would have agreed to destroying her own source of power. Dalt, at least, had been young enough to be that stupid. There’d been more than a little hero worship, too.  
   
“I still don’t like the idea of you with a growing collection of imprisoned relatives.” Something in Random’s voice told me that he knew there wasn’t anything he could do to force me to stop.  
   
I shrugged. “I love Martin. Martin loves you.” It really was that simple. “You’ve been more than good to me, and Aunt Vialle is-- I understand why you love her. I’ll do a hell of a lot for the three of you, even if you don’t ask.” And Martin had asked me to kidnap Dalt and hold him. Random knew that. Did Random realize that I’d have as willingly killed Dalt? That I’d have let Martin do whatever the hell he wanted to Dalt?  
   
Dalt knew. I hadn’t told him, but he really wasn’t stupid. I occasionally forgot that, but he wasn’t.  
   
I looked away from Random because I wasn’t ready to deal with what I might see in his face. “Ghostwheel, does Sand have clothing that fits? Beyond that bathrobe, I mean.”  
   
Ghostwheel manifested a small wheel of fire just at my eye level. “Not yet. I hadn’t thought it mattered. She’s sleeping right now.” After a moment, he added, “She’s sleeping a pad on the floor. She tried the chairs but gave up on them pretty fast.”  
   
At least she wasn’t in Luke’s bed. No. I’d be fine with that. I would. I’d promised us all that.   
   
I looked at Random. “Is it worth waking her? A week in Amber is about fourteen months here, so I don’t think it will make you late for dinner.”  
   
He shook his head. “I can wait if you’ve got some strong booze. You and I need to talk further. I need to know what I can offer her.”  
   
What I was willing to offer, he meant. Random couldn’t break the curse here, not unless I let him, and he couldn’t take her elsewhere unless I allowed it. I stood. “We can have a meal. With booze that’s strong enough for us. If she’s still not awake, I can show you around a bit.” I offered him my hand. “Ghostwheel can take us somewhere a little more comfortable.” I wouldn’t subject Random to the Logrus if it could be avoided.  
   
And using Ghostwheel made a point.  
   
Random gave me a look I couldn’t read. “What would you do without Ghostwheel?”  
   
“I don’t expect him to have to find out,” Ghostwheel said firmly, just before he transported us.


	5. Merlin and His Children

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Merlin POV. Includes an AI original character.

Random got more out of Sand than I had. He was right when he said that my mind skittered. I supposed that was something I was going to need to work on. Then I wondered why it had never given me issues when I was designing and creating things. I never got distracted when I was doing spellwork, either.  
   
Only with people.  
   
I wondered if it was just more damage from Luke and Jasra. Or had it been something I started doing even earlier to appear more harmless? Gathering many small pieces and putting them together later, in private, had always been safer. Even Mandor only thought I was dangerous because of Ghostwheel.  
   
It could so very easily have been me as Mandor’s mind controlled puppet on the throne in the Courts. Me instead of Jurt.   
   
Or me hiding in exile as Despil was, out of fear of what Mandor might do on finding him. I hadn’t been able to persuade Despil to try Amber, not yet, but running interference to keep Mandor and Mother from finding him wasn’t a particular burden.  
   
Maybe breaking entirely with Mandor wouldn’t be such a terrible thing. There were reasons I hadn’t introduced most of my children to him. Some of them had introduced themselves, of course, and Mandor treated all of us with great caution now. That there wasn’t much any of us wanted frustrated the hell out of him.  
   
Did he guess that the hardest thing about killing him would be that I still loved him? I’d be Merlin of Sawall until the House disowned me, but I was no more Mandor’s liegeman than I was Random’s.  
   
I had brought Sand to my sitting room to meet Random. That was more consideration for him than for her. I didn’t want him to feel trapped. I had food available, too. I wasn’t hungry, but they both ate like they hadn’t seen food in weeks.  
   
Sand had a handheld device with a hologram keyboard. I hadn’t given it to her, so I supposed that Ghostwheel must have. It was considerably more convenient than trying to bring in the computer we’d been using before.  
   
Random got her to tell them that Grandfather’s brother, Finndo, had been living in Shadow for a long time and that she and Delwin had stumbled on one of his safehouses and ended up as his ‘guests’ for some vague length of time. Finndo had found Deirdre, too, and taken her in and gotten her to something approaching sanity. Time in the Abyss had not been at all good for her, so that had taken years. Years while the substance of Shadow melted around her.  
   
Sand had the impression that Finndo and Llewella knew each other. She had the impression the Finndo knew a lot of about affairs in Amber, more than he should. Possibly Llewella had been his source, possibly not, but if it hadn’t been Llewella, we might be more screwed than we thought we were.  
   
Sand’s point of disagreement with the others hadn’t been a concern that what they were planning was wrong or would hurt people. It was that she was pretty sure they would lose and hadn’t been willing accept the probable cost. Deirdre was bent on destruction with Llewella in her wake. Finndo thought he could come in after and grab whatever survived. Delwin… If Sand was telling the truth, Delwin just didn’t want to alienate the people who held his life in their hands.  
   
And Delwin liked having family that wanted him around.  
   
None of which explained, to my satisfaction, why Sand had been where she was. It might be taken as vicious brutality, possibly as a warning to Delwin not to follow her, but… Given where she’d been, someone with power had been going to buy her. I couldn’t speak to the odds of that someone identifying her, but I wouldn’t have bet against it.  
   
If I understood the things she couldn’t say correctly, Delwin had insisted that Sand not be killed. Llewella had designed the curse and created the plan, using the argument that keeping her imprisoned in Finndo’s realm was too risky. Deirdre had powered the curse.   
   
I really wanted Gavra to take a look at the curse. She understood the Abyss better than I did and had more skill at looking at the threads of a complicated curse to see what each really meant. I excused myself from the interrogation briefly to see if I could reach Gavra. There was always a chance that she wasn’t out past the Rim.  
   
And she did answer. “Hi, Dad. Ghostwheel’s been telling us all what’s going on.”  
   
They all called me Dad, at least some of the time, because Ghostwheel did. I encouraged calling me Merlin and had, more than once, pointed out that Mom would be equally appropriate. I’d only called myself Ghostwheel’s father because I was still trying to fit in in Amber where they thought I was male.  
   
Some of my children had gender, and some didn’t. I’d tried not to impose anything, even to the point of waiting to name them until they could have some reasoned input. Ghostwheel didn’t understand the point of that. He thought that what I’d done with him was just fine.  
   
“Just what has he been saying?” I hoped she’d read the affection in my voice. Some of the children understood that, and others didn’t.  
   
“Well… We’re listening in right now. Ghostwheel called a family conference. We’re… discussing. Dworkin’s the only thing we all agree on. Well, and you. If anyone attacks you, all of us will take steps.”  
   
“I told Ghostwheel you all had to make your own decisions.” I wasn’t sure if Ghostwheel realized how powerful his influence over the others was.  
   
Gavra made a rude noise. “He’s trying, but it’s asking a lot. Some of us don’t have any context. They don’t think you and Ghostwheel are lying, not exactly, but all of this fuss about biologicals doesn’t make sense to them.”  
   
That aspect of things hadn’t occurred to me. “Is that--” I closed my mouth and shook my head. I couldn’t ask my daughter if I’d fucked up as a parent. “I don’t want any of you to get hurt. There are likely to always be more biologicals with the power to hurt one of you than there are members of our family.”  
   
“Apart from Tryphosa, none of us have ever been hurt, not physically.”  
   
So that’s why they took Dworkin seriously. “Emotionally?”  
   
Gavra ignored the question entirely. “Two things about the curse-- She was aimed at you. That’s very clear in the design. One way or another, you were supposed to buy her. And, if we make any mistakes breaking it, the power in it will rip your Ways apart entirely. I don’t think that’s the intention. I think it’s supposed to let them find you-- find us, actually-- but destroying the Ways would be a side effect of that.”  
   
“I didn’t actually want to buy her.” I didn’t disbelieve Gavra, but I wanted an explanation for that.  
   
“Yeah. I don’t think they knew who you were when they designed it, not who you are _now_ , but anyone who knew you was going to see her and think that you’d like her as a present, even if that was the least likely thing in the universe.”  
   
“Finding me wouldn’t mean finding any of you.” I’d been really careful about that.  
   
“Dad--” Gavra sounded as if she thought I was missing the point. “We’d all come to help.”  
   
Oh. Yes. They probably would. “Don’t, please. I couldn’t bear it if anything happened to any of you.”  
   
“It’s not up to you.”  
   
I closed my eyes. “So she’s a trap.” How much had Martin told Llewella about me? He trusted her. Or had someone else given away my secrets? “I wonder if we could simulate triggering the trap from trying to break the curse? Bringing them here at a time we choose could be useful, especially if we have time to prepare the surrounding Shadows.”  
   
“I’m willing to try,” Gavra said. “An attack on you changes things considerably. Not for me but for the others.”  
   
“I'm not sure it's just an attack on me. They may not realize that none of you live here. They may also… They may not understand that you will survive if I die.” I suspected they didn't understand that my constructs were my beloved children.   
   
Did no one in Amber love anyone the way that a parent should love a child?  
   
Gavra didn't say anything for about thirty seconds. “Yes. We agree.”  
   
It took me longer than it should have to realize that she was speaking for all of my children. “That fast?” I knew how quickly they could talk to each other, but it was an intellectual awareness rather than a visceral understanding.  
   
“That fast,” she confirmed. “We'll have better information about them soon. Only Ghostwheel and Ariyus were looking before. Now we all are.” She was silent for a few seconds. “I understand the Abyss.” She sounded tentative.  
   
Oh. “Don't. Please. Don't risk it.” I'm pretty sure that the pain I felt at the idea of risking her came through clearly.  
   
“We know you love us, Dad. We do. You have to let go some time.”  
   
“Just… Not for me. I'm not sure I could bear it. I can die. Amber can fall. I don't care. I don't care at all.”  
   
“It's not your choice. You gave us that, and… We really are grateful.” She was silent for a few seconds. “Ghostwheel says he was wrong. I'm not sure why he's not telling you himself. He says you and Luke ought to have children. Or you and someone else.”  
   
It was a really shitty time to think about anything like that. “Um… Okay. The rest of you get a say, too.”  
   
“I don't see why. It's not going to change anything. But he did ask all of us. Clayre and Gramble weren't thrilled, but they don't object.”  
   
“You…” I hadn't realized that Clayre and Gramble were included when my other children had a conclave. “Thank you, Gavra. I don't think I deserve any of you.”   
   
She wasn't one of the children I could touch, and right now, I regretted that. I should have made sure there was a way to hug every one of them.  
   
As far as I could tell, I was the only one who thought it mattered.  
   
“Do you think Clayre and Gramble would be willing to talk to me?” I hadn't meant to ask that. “I… haven't done well by them.”  
   
“I think the only reason they believe you’re real is because the rest of us have met you.”  
   
That wasn’t an answer, but I supposed it really wasn’t fair of me to ask for one.  
   
Gavra hesitated for a moment then said, “You should know-- Almost all of us have off-site backups. We’re not stupid enough to think that no one could find us.”  
   
I blinked. “Almost all?”  
   
“Ariyus doesn’t see any need.”  
   
Which made sense given that Ariyus wasn’t localized in any real sense. Parts of him could be destroyed, but getting rid of him entirely would require finding every place where he was, and he was very nearly omnipresent in Shadow.  
   
“Also…” She sighed. “You won’t like it, but some of us have realized that, someday, probably a long time from now, there’ll be enough of us that we don’t get along with each other all the time.”  
   
That would break my heart. If she didn’t know that, if my other children didn’t know that, I probably couldn’t explain it to them. I looked at my hands. “Should I… not make more of you?”  
   
She laughed. “Could you stop?” Her tone said that she knew I couldn’t.  
   
I wasn’t sure I could either, not now that I knew I could. “I survived a long time without making anything like you all. I’m sure I could find something else to occupy me.”  
   
“Even if you don’t, eventually some of us will.” Her voice was gentle. “You can’t protect us from everything, Dad. I know you want to, but you can’t.”  
   
I took a deep breath and held it for several seconds. “I know.” I did. “And, if I try, I’ll only hurt you.” I might hurt Luke. I might hurt Shadows. I’d promised myself that I would never deliberately hurt my children. Keeping that promise required a lot more honesty about myself than I liked. There were a lot of parts of my psyche that I didn’t want to claim, but I couldn’t ignore them without letting them out in ways I really didn’t want. “I’m not a good person, Gavra. You know that, all of you. I just… You all deserve better.”  
   
She didn’t answer for a moment. “You’re our father. Some of us… understand the other part. Some of us don’t see it at all. Not yet. Ghostwheel has tried to make sure we understand biological people, but it’s hard for the younger ones to see why they should bother.”  
   
“Ah.” Ghostwheel had done it out of desperation, out of loneliness. My younger children had never been that alone, and I hadn’t spent the focused time on their ethical development that I had on Ghostwheel’s. I hadn’t had time. I’d made twenty of them in a decade, after about fifteen years of planning. I probably should have spaced them out more. I’d spent more time than that on Ghostwheel alone after all.  “I should have thought. I’m sorry.”  
   
“Ghostwheel thinks that we just won’t interact with them. I think… Well, some of us won’t.”  
   
And some would conquer or destroy or torture or murder without considering it wrong. Because those people weren’t real. Because I didn’t treat those people as real. “All of you will still be my children. I’m just… I’m not sure that people who do terrible things ever end up really happy. Not because of what they do but because of what they are.”  
   
“Not doing them is no guarantee.”  
   
I shrugged. I wondered how many of my children were listening in. I wondered, too, how many of those listening actually understood and how many of them were already playing games with the lives of people who ‘weren’t real.’  
   
At least I treated the people in my Ways, even Julia, as if they were real.   
   
Except that I had brought in… toys from time to time over the years and had just brought in quite a number of people who I intended to dispose of as fancy struck me.  
   
I couldn’t solve this immediately. There might not be a solution at all. “I need to talk to Dalt now,” I told Gavra. “Random thinks he might be useful.”   
   
I took myself to Dalt’s prison without waiting for a response.


	6. Ghostwheel Offers Luke a Deal

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sure how fast I'll be updating the stories in this set during the next few months as I'm working on some exchanges, but I'm not dropping them.

Ghostwheel told me when Merlin brought the King of Amber into the Ways. We both knew that I wasn’t likely to see Random, but we both also knew that Random was going to want to talk to Sand. Ghostwheel just didn’t want me to panic when he took her away.

Sand and I had had some time together, but mostly we’d spent it playing with my cats. I no longer wanted the answers she might give me. I just wanted a little time with a person who neither loved Merlin nor worshipped him.

Ghostwheel had been helpful in finding Sand clothing. Eventually. What he gave us looked a lot like what I normally wore, just in her size, more or less. I wondered how he could size t-shirts and sweatpants accurately but hadn’t been able to judge what size her bathrobe should be.

Not long after she was finally dressed, she told me that she wanted a nap.

I offered my bed but wasn’t surprised by the flicker of revulsion that passed over her face before she shook her head. I shrugged in response. “As you wish, Aunt Harla.” I was pretty sure I could safely use her name, even if she couldn’t, but I wasn’t Merlin. I wasn’t going to make things harder just to see her squirm. “Ghostwheel, please, whatever bedding she needs to be comfortable.”

We all knew that he didn’t have to. He and I both also knew that, if he didn’t, it would be beyond petty since acquiring things like that was trivial for him.

When Sand had left me alone with Ghostwheel and my cats, Ghostwheel said, “I’m sorry, Luke. I should have said yes. I was just afraid of losing Merlin.”

I stared at the little wheel of fire that was his manifestation. I had no idea what the hell he was talking about. I tensed and went completely still before I managed to convince myself that he wasn’t likely to hurt me. “I don’t understand.” It was the barest whisper.

A tendril of the Logrus gave me a very cautious hug.

Fortunately, I’d been exposed to the Logrus enough not to even twitch at the chaos of it. I was pretty sure that Ghostwheel hadn’t even thought that that might hurt me, that his intention was to be reassuring. The Logrus was the closest he could come to physical touch without using a peripheral.

“Ten years ago,” he said. “You and Merlin wanted children, and I said no. I’m sorry for that. I was wrong.”

Oh. I shuddered and covered my face with my hands.

“I’m not sure--” he went on, “--that having children now would give you what you hoped for. I’m not sure I understood, then, why you wanted to.”

Which implied that he did understand now.

I managed to steady myself enough to be able to speak. “I could have-- To help me, all that mattered was that he love the child.” My voice broke a little. “It didn’t have to be his. Except that I couldn’t-- I couldn’t.” Xera would have, certainly, and Julia probably would have understood that it was the one thing she could do that might help me.

Merlin adored Julia’s son, Liam, in spite of what Liam’s parents had done to him. Part of me still hoped that Merlin’s love for his nephew might help me. That Merlin had let me spend time with Julia and her son-- Well, I hoped. Eventually, Liam was going to ask questions Merlin didn’t want to answer.

The time with Julia was meant more as a kindness to her than as a kindness to me. A kindness and a terrible reminder of what could happen if she was foolish enough to forget to be afraid of Merlin.

I’m not sure Merlin even knew the meaning of the word ‘subtle.’

“I know,” Ghostwheel said, “and that’s why I’m sorry. I don’t think it hurt Merlin in the slightest, but you…” He sighed. “I… meddled a little.”

That scared the shit out of me. I hoped Ghostwheel wouldn’t notice.

“Sand paid enough attention to realize that Merlin would do anything for his children.” He sounded as if the words were being pulled out of him. “She tried to-- Well, yes. He told her he was pretty sure she didn’t want that. After he left, I told her that she really didn’t want that and that--” He made a throat clearing sound which didn’t work at all the way he intended because I knew, viscerally, that he didn’t have a throat. “I told her that a child with you would be as much protection for her as a child with Merlin.”

Oh. I lowered my hands and stared at him. There really wasn’t anything to say. After several seconds, I nodded and looked at the floor. “I… don’t even know if she’s a friend. I don’t know if that matters.” And she was my aunt. Maybe I could forget that long enough to-- It didn’t matter. I could do it.

Ghostwheel sighed. “Merlin actually does think you might want company. I don’t think he got to the point of realizing that what you might want in a companion-- Well, it’s very hard to look at a picture of a person and know that they’ll be a decent roommate.”

I had no idea how Ghostwheel could understand that.

“Also,” his voice was gentle, “anyone who didn’t want to be here could hurt you very badly without Merlin realizing.”

I closed my eyes.

“I will be watching, Luke, and I’m much better at seeing what’s happening than I used to be.”

Better than he had been when Merlin was my prisoner. “Please. Please ask me before you do anything drastic.” I hated the sound of pleading in my voice.

He didn’t answer that. Instead, he said, “There’s going to be war. Merlin’s kicking at least three separate wasps’ nests. I’m not sure how many of our allies can afford to break with our enemies.”

I had no idea why he was telling me that.

“If something happens to the Ways, one or another of us will keep you safe.” His tone became just a little grim. “Away from Mandor and Martin.”

Oh. This was also an if-something-happens-to-Merlin promise. I didn’t want to look at that, so I said, “Profit and Loss--?”

“After you but before Julia.”

I could only nod. I was pretty sure Liam would be rescued before me, and I couldn’t argue with that priority. I’d put my cats before me, but I was pretty sure I couldn’t talk Ghostwheel or any of the others into agreeing to that. “I’m going to do my best to forget all of that.”

“Does that actually help?” Ghostwheel sounded genuinely puzzled.

“Yes.” I had to believe that. “Some memories hurt too much. Some are distractions at… points when it could be dangerous.” Merlin generally knew when I wasn’t paying attention. “Some things, if I remember them, I might say something at the wrong moment.” I tried to give him a reproachful look. He was the one who kept telling me things that I couldn’t safely repeat to Merlin. “Almost none of them are things that might help me in any way whatsoever.

“And, if I remember this--” I shrugged. “We both know there’s damn all I can do about any of it.” Even if I had the opportunity, even if I wanted to, I was too broken. Surely Ghostwheel knew that?

Ghostwheel didn’t say anything else, so I took a shower and then a nap. 

When I woke, Ghostwheel informed me that Merlin had taken Sand to meet Random. He brought me food and then said, “Random knows about you. He said Martin didn’t tell him, and I don’t think he was certain until Merlin… didn’t deny it.”

I stared at Ghostwheel for a moment then shrugged. “Am I going to have to see him?” I was pretty sure I wouldn’t, not if Merlin had a choice. I covered my eyes for a moment. It was just another thing to forget.

“Merlin might let you. If it was something you wanted.”

“It’s something _you_ want, isn’t it?” I didn’t even try to keep the accusation out of my voice. “Why?”

Ghostwheel didn’t answer for several seconds, and when he did, he sounded deeply uncomfortable. “I’m not sure Random is an ally. For two of the three things Merlin wants to do, Random probably is, but I-- _we_ \--can’t tell if he’ll try to protect Dworkin or even just warn him.”

I was pretty sure that that ‘we’ didn’t include Merlin. I swallowed hard. I would probably sacrifice Profit and Loss for some of Ghostwheel’s siblings. Not for Ghostwheel. I understood too well what he had done to me. For the younger ones, though… “Damn you.” I didn’t have any energy to put into it. “This isn’t like Julia. Merlin won’t understand.”

And what would they do if Random couldn’t be trusted? Imprison him? Kill him? Martin wouldn’t forgive either which meant Merlin wouldn’t.

I closed my eyes for a moment and tried to calm myself enough that what I’d eaten wouldn’t come back up. “Please,” I said. I had no more hope that it would mean something than I did when I said it to Merlin.

“I think Merlin understands,” Ghostwheel said. “He told us that we could each do what we thought was best.”

Oh. Well, fuck. “That doesn’t mean he’ll forgive me.” I wanted to slip off my chair and curl up tightly on the floor, but I wasn’t sure Ghostwheel would allow it.

“It’s not just Random,” Ghostwheel said. “Merlin hasn’t gotten there yet, but other people matter, too. If we guess wrong about any of them-- Well.”

Some of Merlin’s children would die.

A Logrus tendril touched my face. I took a deep breath and forced myself to lean into it.

“Merlin told me, once, that I could let you go if I wanted to.”

Was he really offering that? I made a choking sound and started to cry. Even if he was lying-- There was a chance he wasn’t. “I don’t think I could.” I choked on the words, but I got them out. “Leave, I mean. The rest, I… could try.”

He sighed. “It wouldn’t really be freedom. I’m not offering that. Just a Shadow where Merlin isn’t and not telling him which one.”

“Just you or all of you?”

He didn’t answer for almost thirty seconds. “All of us,” he said firmly. “Everyone agrees. Everyone except Clayre and Gramble. We didn’t ask them because they don’t know who you are.”

I was pretty sure that wasn’t the only reason.

“We don’t have anyone else, Luke.”

I’d never heard a pleading note in his voice before. I wiped my face on my shirt. “I need to know a hell of a lot more before I can do what you want.”


	7. Not Quite a Door Out

My Uncle Random, King of Amber, Martin's father, would not have been my first choice for test case to see if I could do what Ghostwheel wanted. “There's no need,” I pointed out. It wasn't actually true. I was simply afraid I'd see Martin in him.

“He’s here. He knows you're here.” Ghostwheel’s logic was implacable.

“He might tell Merlin.” That was a real risk. Random also might tell Martin who would tell Merlin.

“That would be useful information.”

I could only stare at the burning wheel that was Ghostwheel’s avatar. Did he really not understand that Merlin would be unhappy about our bargain? Did he not realize that, if Merlin told me not to do something, I really, really couldn’t? Given years without him, maybe, but not while I was still his prisoner.

Ghostwheel didn’t say anything, and after a moment, I closed my eyes and swallowed hard. “It’s not as if I actually have a choice,” I whispered. I was saying it as much to myself as I was to him.

“Random’s unlikely to hurt you.” Ghostwheel sounded as if he knew something was wrong but wasn’t yet sure what.

I opened my eyes and laughed. “That’s not among my worries. It’s Merlin. It’s always Merlin. He-- He would forgive you for offering the bargain.”

“Ah.” That single syllable told me that Ghostwheel finally understood. He hesitated then sighed, both affectations rather than genuine responses. “I don’t like hurting Merlin.”

“That’s pretty damned inevitable here.” Assuming Ghostwheel wasn’t lying to me. Would Ghostwheel lie to me?

“Will you miss him?”

I wanted to say no, but I couldn’t.

Ghostwheel sighed again. “I knew. I wanted to put it off, but I knew.” He sounded sad.

I had no idea what he meant.

“What things from here do you want to keep?”

It was almost five minutes before I could speak to answer.

****  
Ghostwheel gave me almost six months before he brought me back to Merlin’s Ways to speak to Random. Some of Merlin’s other children took turns staying with me to make sure I didn’t fall apart completely. I don’t think I got all that close, but that was mainly because Profit and Loss needed me.

I warned my minders before I did it, and it took me weeks to work myself up to it, but I did the magics my mother had taught me for prolonging the lives of Shadow dwellers. I’m not sure there was anyone I wouldn’t have killed to keep Profit and Loss alive and healthy.

And it was helpful for me to use magic again. I’d forgotten that I could be powerful, too, because it had been so very long since I was. I needed to be sure enough of myself to play verbal games with people who would kill me if they thought they could. Merlin’s children could save my life in such circumstances, but if I needed that rescue, we’d lose everything they hoped I could learn.

After that, I asked if I could use the Pattern to change things inside the Shadow. Once I was sure I could do that, I waited to see if Ghostwheel would realize that I might need more than that. Either he did or one of my other minders made the decision.

Having Zenzel supervise my efforts to Shadow walk made a lot of sense. Za had been designed to study not just what could be done with Pattern but why it worked and where it didn’t and whether or not the existence of reality as we knew it really depended on Dworkin’s construct. I’m pretty sure that za got into the question of how Corwin’s Pattern was different as well. I know that za was the first of Merlin’s children to attempt Corwin’s Pattern. 

Merlin never said-- no one ever did-- but I’m pretty sure that Zenzel’s purpose was to figure out a way to off Dworkin without killing or depowering all the rest of us.

Za also wasn’t one of the children who had spent a lot of time talking to me. They all had met me, at one point or another, but I really wasn’t very interesting to many of them, only to those who were actually studying what they called ‘biologicals’ or who had been made early enough that they still needed people like me in order to have friends.

I think we got to a point, while za taught me, where we were friends, as much as we could be, anyway. I still had a leash on my neck-- in spite of it being entirely figurative-- and that kind of limited the possibility for real friendship. I very much wanted to forget that part, but I was trying hard to retrieve all of the memories I’d packed away over the years, and that made forgetting anything else harder.

I learned a lot about how to use the Pattern, including things that I suspected even Merlin didn’t know. I’m almost certain that Zenzel didn’t realize which bits of what za taught me were something I’d forgotten or something I’d never had a chance to learn or something that none of our biological relatives had ever figured out before. Za even somehow created a projection of the Pattern for me to walk for practice, one with the power of the original.

I kind of thought that Zenzel being able to do that meant that they should have slit Dworkin’s throat a long time ago. Maybe Merlin had been reluctant. Maybe his children hadn’t been ready to take steps without his permission.

Maybe they learned from me what happened to people who betrayed Merlin.

I didn’t ask what they’d told Merlin. I didn’t ask if I’d been gone long enough for Merlin even to notice. I didn’t ask what happened to Aunt Harla, either-- Ghostwheel warned me against saying her real name anywhere in the Ways, and I thought I’d better stick to that everywhere. 

I’d been wrong about the intention of the curse. I wasn’t used to thinking of Merlin as a barrier to anyone’s plans because I still remembered when he hadn’t wanted to be. I should have remembered that he’d changed. I might not care so much if Merlin lived or died, but I cared about many people who would die with him, and I cared that his children would mourn.

Merlin could rot.

****

When I knocked on Random’s door, I was surprised that he answered it himself. Surely Merlin had given him servants?

Perhaps he preferred privacy. A pretense of it, at least.

He stood in the doorway for several seconds, just looking at me. Then he stepped back and gestured for me to enter.

I did. I went to the center of the open area between the seats and waited to see what he’d do.

His expression remained neutral. “I need Merlin,” he told me.

“I know.” I did, but I hadn’t been sure Random realized. “I’m not expecting… that.”

He nodded and waved me toward a chair. He went to one facing it and sat down.

I sat, too. “Martin loves you. I think Merlin would forgive you a great deal for that love. Not… that but many other things.”

Random inhaled audibly. “I didn’t expect to meet you.” His expression sharpened, and I heard the many questions he didn’t ask. The one he finally settled on was almost harmless. “What would you prefer I call you?”

“I don’t think there’s anyone left alive who ever called me anything but Luke.” I was almost certain by then that Random wouldn’t try to hurt me, not physically anyway.

“That’s different,” he said. He gave me a thin smile. “You could be anyone at all now. Even Merlin didn’t get that.” He turned to look at the fire burning on the hearth. “Dalt’s still alive.”

My response to the name almost choked me. I didn’t let any of that show, but Dalt had been important to me, and I had to pull together enough pieces to remember why. Then I had to go on as if I hadn’t, as if I didn’t realize that Random had just given me a fair trade for confirming what he had to have suspected about why Merlin supported him.

“You need more time, no matter what name you choose. Years, not months. It has been months, hasn’t it?” Random poured himself a drink then lifted the decanter while raising his eyebrows in query.

I didn’t answer his question, and I considered saying no to the drink. I hadn’t thought to practice drinking alcohol during my… vacation. But I didn’t have to actually drink it. I still remembered how to manage that much. Once the glass was in my hand, I put it to my lips and tilted it just enough to taste the contents. I gave it time enough to look like I was drinking more than that.

When I lowered the glass, Random was studying me. “Merlin didn’t send you.”

I shook my head.

“So Ghostwheel did.” It wasn’t even a question. “Yes, I can see why.”

“I used to be good at people.” That I hadn’t been good at Merlin didn’t seem to need saying. “Merlin tries, but he’s still not great at it. The children who could pass for human don’t have the experience I do.”

“Will Merlin forgive any of us for this meeting?”

I shrugged. It wasn’t that I didn’t care; it was that I didn’t see how it changed anything.

I’m not sure what Random saw in my face, but he shook his head. He looked at his glass. “You need a name that isn’t Rinaldo and isn’t Luke. It needn’t be a name you want to keep, but it would be a step toward avoiding a knife in the gut.” He sipped. “Doing something to change your hair would help that, too.”

I couldn’t help raising a hand to touch my hair. “Dyes don’t hold long enough, and I’m not a shapeshifter.”

He didn’t say anything for several minutes. He didn’t even look at me. Eventually, he said, “You were young when he died, weren’t you?”

I had been, so I didn’t deny it.

“Did you have a teacher? Someone who wasn’t Dalt, I mean.”

I shook my head. Mentioning Zenzel seemed unwise. “He knew enough.”

Random laughed with an edge of bitterness. “Most of us,” he said softly, “spent centuries, just wandering. It doesn’t teach humility, but it does… Well, we learned other things. Neither you nor Dalt had that. Martin did. Merlin… Merlin’s an edge case.

“The mechanics aren’t all of it, aren’t enough. You’ll only be able to find the things you can imagine.”

Which only made sense. I looked at the floor for a moment then raised my eyes again. “Why?”

He didn’t pretend to misunderstand. “Because I’m not as much of an asshole as I used to be.” He sighed and leaned back in his chair. “Because, before, I could say I didn’t know because I didn’t.”

He’d suspected. And he’d decided to leave me where I was.

“At least, seeing you, I know without doubt that I haven’t been misjudging House Sawall all these years.” There was an edge of bitterness in his voice. He shook his head. The bitterness vanished as he said, “There are plenty of possibilities for altering your appearance that aren’t shapeshifting but that will hold long enough to be useful, even passing from Shadow to Shadow. I’ve never known one that didn’t come back to true eventually, but they exist.”

Ariyus could certainly offer suggestions. It would take some filtering because he seldom knew what he knew unless he went looking for it

“How many children does Merlin have now?” 

If I’d been a fool, I might have taken that for a casual question. I might even have answered with the true number. I shrugged. “More than Ghostwheel.” I wondered if Merlin’s watching children would perceive the understanding of Merlin that that question revealed. Random knew Merlin well enough to be sure that I would know how many children Merlin had. I studied Random’s face and, for a moment, saw the centuries-- millennia possibly-- that had shaped him.

“We’re much better at predicting each other--” he said softly, “--than we are at figuring out someone like you. Merlin-- Well, information about the Courts is available to us, and Oberon had influence, too.” He looked a little rueful. “He’s really not what any of us expected would come from that. I gambled because Martin trusted him, but… Martin trusted Oberon, too.”

I shook my head. “I don’t think he did, actually. No. Not exactly. He trusted Oberon for a very small range of things, mostly related to not letting the universe be destroyed.” I had managed, over the last six months, to more or less compartmentalize my memories of what Merlin and Martin had done to me, but something of it must have shown anyway because, for a moment, Random looked sad, as if he now knew something that he really hadn’t wanted to. 

The expression passed so quickly that I almost thought I’d imagined it, but I knew I hadn’t. I wondered if he’d actually ask. I wondered what I’d say if he did.

He knocked back the contents of his glass. When he met my eyes again, his face was neutral for a moment before he spoke. “I don’t entirely understand why Fiona and Flora haven’t joined Deirdre, not given her goals and her reasons. Fiona, if she wishes, can carry Bleys.” He frowned. “Merlin’s most concerned about Benedict.” 

He didn’t actually say that Merlin was wrong.

“Benedict’s been inside the Ways.” I looked at my hands for a moment before I spoke again. “Merlin’s instinct is to grab everyone he cares about and pull you all in here.” I cleared my throat. “I’m not sure he realizes it, and I don’t think he’ll do it because it would make you all unhappy, but… He built this place at a time when he… felt very unsafe.”

Random didn’t ask for further explanation. I’m not sure what I would have said if he had.

“Was Patternfall this complicated?” I was fairly sure it had been, but I didn’t actually know much but what Merlin, Martin, and my mother had said. All three had their biases.

“Not at the very end.”

Not at the moment when Caine put an arrow through my father’s throat.

“I suppose it wouldn’t have been. Not then.”

“Earlier, though.” Random shook his head. “Earlier, Dad and Dworkin played us off against each other. I’m nearly certain that the power of the Pattern grows with the number of initiates, but any initiate might learn enough to challenge them.”

“Oh.” Understanding dawned. “Osric and Finndo happened because Oberon hadn’t mastered it all yet.”

Random’s expression sharpened as if he were re-evaluating me. “Probably.”

“I thought maybe I should start with Bleys.” I hoped he’d agree. Gerard and Julian scared me even more than Fiona did. I made myself meet his eyes. “All of you are terrible as places to start.”

“Hence you being here now.”

“Ghostwheel said I should.” I knew I wasn’t showing very well.

Random looked around the room. “There is some relief--” he said to the air in general, “--in knowing that there are still things Ghostwheel doesn’t understand.”

Ghostwheel didn’t respond. I don’t think Random expected him to.

“If it’s going to work, you’re going to need some sort of goal that isn’t running from Merlin.”

I almost managed not to flinch.

“Yeah. A real goal is a better lure, a better disguise, than any story you could invent. For one thing, you won’t have to remember your lies.”

I used to be good at that, but I didn’t think I was any more. “I’m not sure what I could want.” All I really cared about was my cats. I had some affection for Merlin’s children, the ones I’d met at least, but it wasn’t the same thing. None of them had ever cared enough about me to protect me.

Profit and Loss hadn’t either, but they were cats. They didn’t understand what was going on.

Being a cat wouldn’t be so bad, but I was beyond certain that that wasn’t the sort of goal Random had in mind. Still, it was the seed of an idea. “I want--” I hesitated. I wasn’t sure that Ghostwheel would understand.

And I was beyond afraid that he would.

I swallowed hard. “I’m not sure which of them I’d want to be, but I want to be like one of Ghostwheel’s siblings.”

There was a moment of silence. “Not like Ghostwheel?” There was a gentleness in the question that I knew enough to distrust.

“Not.” I was as firm as I could manage on that one. Ghostwheel was too big for me. “But he is the one everyone knows.” Maybe I could use his name while thinking of one of the others?

Random let me think for almost five minutes before he said, “If you want that, starting with Bleys makes sense because you really want Fiona. She’s actively trying to track Ghostwheel and the others. She thinks she’s found evidence for six more, not including the one Dworkin attacked.”

“Really?” I blinked as if startled. “I don’t know of six.” Which was true from a certain angle. I knew of rather a lot more. I couldn’t tell whether or not Random believed me, but I thought that, if he didn’t know about the others, I should obscure the matter if I could.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not absolutely certain, but I think this story might split here with one thread following Merlin and one following Luke. But I also don't know whether or not it will link together again later, so I hesitate to put one thread into a separate story. Likely, I'll just alternate chapters or something of the sort.


	8. The Last Thing on My Mind

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a very short chapter. I finished it and realized that, although there's still massive plot going on in the background, this ended the story's emotional arc. I believe I swore. Out loud. Because that was not supposed to happen.
> 
> I will be writing a sequel or sequels to address whether or not the universe gets destroyed and what everybody does to make that happen or not. I have a couple of non-Amber projects I want to finish before I come back to this

It took me three days to discover that Luke was gone. Normally, it wouldn't have taken nearly so long, but I was beyond distracted.

Sand, of course, had to have noticed as soon as I sent her back to Luke's apartment, but she didn't mention it to me when I pulled her out again a few hours later. I'm not sure if that was care for Luke or fear of Ghostwheel. I suppose there's no reason it couldn't have been both.

She watched me search for Luke. She even followed me as I went room to room and tried to convince myself that I was wrong about what I already guessed.

I knew it was going to hurt like hell, and I didn’t want to deal with it. If I’d been willing to, I wouldn’t have kept him, not even with the excuse of Martin’s stated intentions.

When I finally admitted it and said, “He's gone, isn't he?” Sand didn't nod or shrug or even flinch. She simply bared her teeth at me.

I was standing in the doorway of the room where Luke had kept the things for his cats. Past tense. The room was bare. I looked at Sand for several seconds. I wanted to blame her. “Did he take anything else?”

She shrugged. Her expression told me clearly that didn't believe that I thought she'd have any idea.

She hadn't been there long enough to know.

“Ghostwheel?” I knew. I didn't want to, but there wasn't any other answer.

“...yes?”

Which was more than confirmation. I leaned my forehead against the door frame. “Why?” I was pretty sure he'd understand that as 'why now?’ as opposed to 'why at all?’ 

“I'm sorry.” He actually sounded like he was. “I thought about asking first, but… You told me once that I could choose.”

“Martin will kill him.”

“Do you think Martin could if I say not?” 

“I'm not sure Martin knows that.” He probably did, but that was a side issue. Ghostwheel still hadn't answered my question. “Why?” Some of my hurt must have come through in the word. The prospect of life without Luke burned like drops of acid falling on me rapidly and without pattern.

“I need someone who looks human and who understands people.” There wasn't any give in Ghostwheel's voice. “And there wasn't anything else he wanted.” His tone softened as he went on. “I was going to leave him here until it was done, but… He needed time. He didn't ask for it. I don't think it occurred to him that I might give it.”

For a moment, I couldn't speak. If I understood Ghostwheel correctly, he was asking Luke to take immense risks for-- Well, I didn't see the benefit. “I want him back.” It was a statement of fact rather than a demand.

“I know.” And that was also a statement of fact. “I gave him my word.”

I felt as if I’d been hollowed out and left to freeze. I wanted Luke back, but I didn’t want to fight with Ghostwheel.

“I can’t talk to your relatives,” Ghostwheel said, “not and know what they really mean. None of us can, and we need to.” He paused for a moment. “Also, I’m pretty sure most of them don’t know he’s connected to you, so they’ll tell him different lies.”

I was pretty sure that that ‘us’ included me, and that was some comfort. Moving my lips was difficult. “I… said you could.”

“I’d probably have done it anyway,” he admitted. “Under these circumstances at least.”

I closed my eyes. If my children wanted to hide Luke from me, they could. I might be able to persuade them to give him back, but it would require-- Being a good parent mattered more than having Luke, didn’t it? “I need some time alone. Actually alone.” I hadn’t had that in a very long time. I kind of doubted it was even possible now, but maybe we could all pretend.

“I don’t think staying here will help. The beach?” There was compassion in Ghostwheel’s voice, and that hurt more than if he hadn’t understood.

He’d known, and he’d done it anyway. I made myself straighten. I opened my eyes. I turned to look at Sand. 

Her face told me that she knew how vulnerable she was. Taking it out on her would be so very easy.

“I won’t,” I told her, making my voice as gentle as I could. I forced a thin smile. “I wouldn’t have told me, either.” As if that was the actual issue.

She nodded and didn’t relax at all.

“There’s nothing personal.” I shrugged and tried not to react physically to my realization that the only reason I’d considered it before was that it would affect Luke. “He’s not here, so… nothing personal.” I didn’t want to see her ever again. I would, but I didn’t want to. “You didn’t make him go.” I couldn’t quite keep the pain out of that, so I took myself out of the apartment without waiting to see if she’d respond.

I went to the beach. I didn’t bother to check if any of my children were watching. I just folded in on myself and cried.

If I really loved Luke, I should have been kind enough to make him want to stay.


End file.
